Fables of Red
by Eye0fEmeralds
Summary: True to her name, the incendiary princess has a knack for getting into trouble. Follow Flame Princess on her journey away from her home and into the unknown in search for a solution to her relationship problems. Set immediately following "Hot to the Touch". First Fan-Fiction, please read and review!
1. Where it Begins

_Note from the Author: Welcome, readers, to my first ever fan fiction! I spent quite a bit of time watching Adventure Time this summer and I decided to finally get a FanFiction account and upload my own story!-a story full of adventure, romance, suspense, and a (relatively) mathematical fight scene! Oh, and romance nerds out there, I'm a guy who likes romance like Jake does but I'm not one to write about it, so the romance won't be too intensive. I'll just write things that I think I would like to hear._

_I was … kind of sorta…inspired to write this when I read other Flame Princess fictions and hated how the authors portrayed her as fragile (don't take offense if you are one of them! It's just a preference!). While watching "Incendium" and "Hot to the Touch" like ten times each, I believe I got a good glimpse at FP's gears to the best of my ability and have surmised that FP isn't at all fragile…she just doesn't like feeling pain in any way. Also, I'm not so good at dialogue, so forgive me if some of the characters seem to be a sliver out of their river. I will try to write of them as the original storyboard-ers do!_

_The story is mostly in Flame Princess' POV._

_Disclaimer: Right, so since this a fan based website I'm pretty sure everyone here is aware that I don't own Adventure Time or its characters, just the plot._

_Enough chatter and let's get on with the lumpin' story!_

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**Chapter 1: Where it Begins**

_Prologue_

"Good bye, Finn…" _No sense in pursuing him…_

No, there wasn't any sense in going after a life full agony. There was nothing to do now but to wait for another evil prince to waltz his way into the molten carmine palace and whisk her away again, even though she despised admitting it. Exploration was out of the question; the recent transpiration eliminated that option. It was no fun anymore to explore the mysterious lands she never had a chance to understand, not with the heavy sensation of lost hopes and desires simply drawingher to the earth. _Just regress to exactly what you've been doing for the past decade. It's not so bad, I guess._

The incandescent princess of embers reluctantly fueled her propelling wisp, the very thing allowed her to glide above the blades of grass. Darkness made her lambency emblazon the foreign path in front her, and gave detail to things she didn't commonly lay her amber gaze upon. Trees were one of them. Although it wasn't sight that guided her home anyway, but a linkage of essence, a bond that shoved her in the right direction. After all, home is where the heart is. Speaking of hearts, she wished her depression would let loose the curiosity that welled within her. If only life wasn't so cruel, if only Finn wasn't made of water, if only fire didn't burn everything. Fire was so destructive at times it even made _her_ sick. Just that there are a special few things in Ooo that were too precious to lose but are lost anyway in a nocuous conflagration and transmuted to nothing but worthless carbon.

It wasn't long until she found her way back to the Fire Kingdom. The familiar raging of lava and the billowing of sulfuric gases calmed her soul somewhat back to serenity. She took her sweet time traversing the rugged terrain to her abode so that she may relish in this peaceful state of mind and recollect her thoughts. Undoubtedly her patriarch would make a snide remark at her return, but Flame Princess planned to ignore it as best she could. She did not however foresee what her father would actually say to her once she breezed in through the rune embedded palace doors.

"What brings you back so soon?" he boomed from his uncomfortable looking throne. "You should be out embracing that sick-minded excuse for a prince…" He didn't seem at all happy at the sight of his beloved daughter despite his apparent hatred for Prince Finn. It had only been a couple of hours into the night since his daughter's departure, yet somehow he had truly believed she would have at least spent the night at his castle. Surely he had enough decency to offer the dame a place to stay after their first date? The poor man was simply confused, for he believed all of the wrong things. On the contrary, Flame Princess never engaged in a date nor did she ever really get to talk to her prince.

"It's not going to work out with us, Father. I'll just wait for another prince to find me," sullenly replied the princess. She began to ease back into her lantern when the king surprisingly stopped her.

His armor extended out in the way to prevent his precious jewel from wallowing in any more melancholy. Oh, the sight of her withered complexion made him flare up with hatred! "Unacceptable." It was impossible to bear it and he wouldn't allow it any longer. "There's always a way to make things work, however despicable…" He then bent down, his face now very close to his daughter's. "This is your first prince. Don't let the wind blow this chance away from you. You'll never know if you can get it back."

His words inspired a hopeful glow to her demeanor yet she still clung to uncertainty. "Do you really think it could work, Father?"

"I most certainly do." Such promise. No longer did she fear for the pain that had wreaked her body from contact with the water prince. She felt utter hope that her father was right, and the doubt was just a speck of dust wavering in her rising flame. "Now you get yourself an invigorating slumber and head of to your prince. I don't want you to dawdle around Ooo stirring up trouble, so head straight there, understood?"

She enthusiastically nodded her cute rounded cranium and affirmed her father's inquiry. Of course she understood. Why wouldn't she? He had just promised there would be a way to transcend laws of nature in order to romance with her elemental opposite. And he ordered her to… not stick her embers where they didn't belong. Somehow she knew she wouldn't be able to comply with that restriction. The flaming princess is in fact one to be easily overwhelmed with certain emotions and at times she could not control her actions. But his order worried her not, for the looming cloud of melancholy had been chased away with a renewed promise for love, the eye of every girl's dreams.

Settling into a sleeping position with her magic lantern, the princess drifted into a slumber full of euphoria throughout the night. _Wait a bit longer my dear, and you will be rightfully rewarded…_

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_AN: Next chapter soon! Don't forget to give me feedback. You never know if it will make me finish it faster. So hit that blue button down there…_


	2. An Ocean of Ice

_Note from the Author: Second chapter is here. Thank you all for the nice reviews! I'll try to keep the story going, but sometimes I feel like the first chapters are the best and the rest just goes downhill. This chapter definitely is going to be one of the more boring ones. Oh, and I won't write any more disclaimers from now on. You should know by now I don't own Adventure Time by now._

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**Chapter 2: An Ocean of Ice**

_The first adventure_

Dawn brought no new light into the Fire Kingdom. The eternal crimson sky offered the only real change, whereas during the night it was a choking deep red. Flame Princess awoke to the gong her fire servants rang, a loud, annoying reverberation that was emitted once the clock struck five. She spiraled her limbs above her head in a great, beautiful, awakening stretch, and she lifted her flames around into a peak of joy, filling the lantern with a dazzling light. _Today would be wonderful day!_ No doubt about it. Everything she had hoped for as a child with big dreams would at last come together again in a single day. Hopefully. The Cosmic Owl could possibly replace every second of alert anticipation with a slurred comprehension, and allow the days to meld together and free her of worries.

_What would it be like? _She thought, pausing mid-stretch for a brief moment. _What would it be like to actually live life?_ It was truly a good question to ask one's self, for all of hers had been wasted waiting in a magical lamp. The first thing that came to mind was fire, but that was any different from where she was now. Unfortunately, living was just another word listed in her book of uncertainties. Today _better_ take that word out of that book, or she would definitely lose it**.**

Of course her father had to break her train of thought. "Well? Aren't you leaving?" He was quite frank about it. He didn't even bother to greet her morning. Not upsetting, to say the least…

Flame Princess wound the flames emanating from her body around her feet with pure finesse and hopped out of the lamp, onto the ornate basalt flooring. The transition from the cold, rusty gold bottom of the chandelier to super-heated rock titillated her bare feet. "Yes, Father."

Flame King smiled a beaming smile with something on his mind. "I don't look forward to your return, for that would mean you have failed." The twist of words gave a sense of childish banter, as if a youngling was trying to make a joke out of feelings that shouldn't normally be messed with. "And do remember how proud I am of you, E-…"

"-Yes, yes, proud of whatever it is parents are proud of," she cut in short-temperedly, like a typical modern teenager, though not rudely. "You're right: I really should be going now." Finishing her goodbyes with a forced rush, Flame Princess was out of the palace, engulfed in her bodily inferno. The patriarch's own farewell was barely caught on the wind. His words simply rose with the fumes and were soon forgotten. Now, it may seem as though the royal two prefaced on a foul relationship. But that is not the case. No, it was the complete opposite for them. Princess hot-head loved her father, and her love was ever so evident in her recent goodbye. Conversations like those are only attributed to the people of the Fire Kingdom, given that most of the elementals here are unable to delineate between good and evil.

Enough of the dead-end road and in with the new. It was time to actually envision what lay ahead of her, instead of asking herself questions whose answers eluded her. Finally outside of the kingdom Flame Princess halted her fire to continue her thoughts. She merely plopped herself onto the lush greenery and began devising a plan. The plan was to follow Flame King's orders and go to directly to Prince Finn's castle and ask him to find a way to avoid the pain they brought each other. But wait just a minute! Didn't he admit to her his incapability of intelligence? Especially in her presence, he was utterly useless. "I believe his exact words were: 'My brain goes all stupid when I'm around you!'" she thought aloud, gesticulating her hands near her head. Surely he wouldn't be able to think of something for their romance.

Sighing, the promise land seemed to get a whole lot farther away from her. His stupidity just _had_ to rain on her blazing parade. The plan now split into two roads, one of which would require every ounce of bravery to surpass. Flame Princess either had the option to travel throughout Ooo on her own to solve this chemistry issue or trust in the knowledge of her crush. The former of them seemed to be based more on hard soil. She could easily find the answer herself should Finn fail her, so it seemed more logical to engage upon that first. "Then it is settled! I'll search the lands for the answer myself_._" With that said she then rose to her feet and began hovering above a bonfire.

Looking around at her environment FP pondered which direction she should move the bonfire to. There were a few courses she could choose at this point: east of her position would led into an ominous desert filled with ancient artifactsand home to earthen elementals; north led into the heart of the grasslands, and eventually to the lonesome tree where she believed Finn lived; last but not least, heading southwest would take her into the obsidian plateaus of the Fire Kingdom, which were veiled in curtains of steam. How intriguing that area of hell was. Where all the steam came from was still a mystery to her, despite the fact it was part of her home.

Subconsciously she glided toward the plateaus of obsidian without a thought on her mind. It was a pure sign that curiosity had taken over as it guided her to the southern depths of Ooo. On the side a few lava golems bathing in a magmatic hot tub sent glares of astonishment her direction, but she paid them no mind. She was focused on the distant columns of wispy vapor that stood out against the malign red. Upon seeing them Flame Princess accelerated to the point where she was travelling at near the speed of light. So fast was she travelling that she had to explode herself with tremendous force over the reaching walls of the plateaus, when they suddenly conjured themselves out of thin air.

Flat, moist rock and fire wolves greeted the elemental at the precipice. Even the wolves gave the royal teen looks that asked, "What is that evil girl doing out in the wild?", and they shrank back to their rightful places out of the girl's way. She mistook their fear as hatred and added the wolves to growing list of things that hated her. Pretty soon she'd have to write the all down on a strip of lava rock in order to remember them all… But besides the constantly smothering steam at one end of the plateaus, the precipice was now rather barren.

It was a pitifully boring place to live, with no significant landmarks of any scripture. No matter though, the steaming lands were still left to be explored. Perhaps there was something of value that withheld magical purposes, hidden amongst the eternal fog. It was difficult walking through, however, as the humidity began to soil her flames to a more lavender hue and added an immense weight to her muscles. Discomfort was the only thought that surfaced through curiosity. Not only that, but the loud obnoxious vapor beclouded her vision. The only thing that drove Flame Princess forward was determination to fulfill her ultimate goal, though she considered giving up the fruitless search in the smoke multiple times. That was before a foreboding laugh sounded behind the veil.

It cackled without end and seemed mischievous and rather witchy. Almost _vampiric. _Whichever it was, it sent icy tendrils from the ruby embedded in the princess' chest. "Hello? Is anyone there?" started the princess. Hisses from the rising air were the only response, along with the continuous laughter. The whole situation was very unsettling, especially since Flame Princesses had never experienced such suspense and blood-rushing, heart-pounding, fear driven adrenaline. Arming herself with balls of fire, she called out once more.

"Who's there? Show yourself!"

When again the sounds did not falter, she rapidly threw projectiles into the steam without a valid target. Aimlessly shooting at the wind sometimes helped the situations, but it greatly depended on what the victim was. Sometimes one of your shots hit something vital you didn't know was vital before, and your obstruction fell apart. In this case, it was a nameless apparition malevolent in nature, and it did not take kindly to the aggression that came from the elemental. With all its might it retaliated with a blinding light, one that gave mass to the collision-less gases and dumped them upon the only entity it could. Liters of steam had turned into kilos of a freezing wet substance. She found herself buried one meter (about three feet) in snow.

Pain gripped her limbs as the fire was chilled to a dangerously low temperature. Her screams of despair drowned out the fading cackles of the witch. Flaring up an internal nova to rekindle her lively glow, the princess melted away a rather large field of snow and ice and revealed a completely new atmosphere. The charred obsidian plateaus appeared to have given way to towering pillars of gleaming ice. Only one place in all of Ooo could hold such arctic qualities, the Ice Kingdom; which meant somehow she was teleported miles north into the icy domain in an instant. Magic of that witch, she surmised, was most likely responsible.

Further investigation was needed right now, for that laugh didn't sound like a witch. It resembled more the throaty chuckle of some type of vampire. That she was sure of. Just to be safe, she spread the fire burning at the edges of her dress into a broader radius as she walked towards a nearby evergreen dressed in white. When the heat neared the arboreal entity it sagged, which drew a thoroughly intrigued _ooh_ from the princess. Even closer and liquid dripped from the shivering tips. At contact it completely diffused to the snowy ground and ignited the tree, bringing another cliché of awe. Everything certainly seemed like it was alive; no hallucinations could be detected as of yet. Maybe she had been invading someone's territory back at the plateaus, and the magical being in question wanted her to congeal in the frigid climate of the north? It was all incredibly logical, but none of it was incredibly important. As of now the task was to find a solution, not add more mysteries to the list of things to solve.

Shaking the head cured from her the lapse of officiousness and Flame Princess continued her search in the Kingdom of Ice, a likely place for an artifact to quell fires or for a home knowledgeable wizard of polar genre. "If I were something important," she said to herself, finger to the mouth, "where would I hide?" Why, in that dark frozen cave down yonder, of course! All the fables her dad disclosed to her years ago depicted valuable artifacts to be obscured in grotto of sorts. This one should be no different from the rest.

The air was a bit more chilling inside the cave than it was outside in the morning sun, so the princess had to again send a pulsing wave of heat to counteract the frigidness. At least the air was dry and not moist so that it wasn't as difficult to embellish the flames, unlike the previous flatlands that bordered the Isle of Steam. Walking calmly into the depths of the ice cavern she stole glances behind every stalagmite and stalactite she came across, each with no luck. When she reached a staircase forged from the ice her eyes stopped darting around every corner, for the sign of civilization meant Flame Princess had approached something of interest. She began the arduous climb on the melting stairs.

Glimmering blue crystal careened upward through center of the frozen mountain and diverged into a labyrinth of aquamarine walls, of which were illuminated by the tangerine glow of fire. Stairs upon stairs ascended into the heavens forever, separated only by portholes in the shape of hungry mouths. The layout of the maze resembled a dungeon far less than it did someone's humble abode. In fact, every now and then a room the girl came across was dappled with chilling furniture and littered with peripherals. Numerous times she thought she caught glimpses of small black and white animals resting on top of cheetah skin beds, though it was too dark to rightfully distinguish them from the dark dividers. One of the chambers had peaked her curiosity halfway to the heavens, and Flame Princess diverted the search from the stairwell for inspection.

The long room was practically filled to the brim with junk, leftover meals, and nonsensical magazines, some of which were entitled "Princess Weekly" and pictured a blonde princess on the cover. But that wasn't what had sparked the kindling flame at the entrance . It was a metal door situated at the end of the dimly lit chamber that had done so, a door imprinted with the simple two-word phrase, keep out. _I bet there's a load of treasure behind this door!_, thought the inquisitive explorer, as she clasped her arms together and let out streams of incinerating heat. The inferno melted the ice among the frame of the portal and, slowly but surely, the door came loose. However, before it was completely free, an alarm organic in origin sounded just behind her.

Feet of a dozen reverberated down the lengthy chamber in an intimidating echo. Flame Princess turned around to see a large abominable caterpillar making its way toward the door, defensively holding up two weapons on the sides of its face. She redirected the flamethrower at the carnivorous entomophage but was interrupted by fists protruding from the walls and floor. They grasped her arms and legs firmly and prevented her from melting the arctic beast, and a good job at doing so. Until the princess realized they were made out of ice as well, so that they could easily. In a flurry of embers she was out of the entanglement and back into action, running up to the caterpillar with a battle cry. It blasted laser beams from the two weapons on its head right before it was silence by a volcanic tackle and crumbled to nothing more than a steaming puddle of water. The entire ordeal had concluded in a few short moments, and the 13-year old was left somersaulting back to the staircase into a grotesque figure.

"Oh, hehe, this time it _is _a princess!" came the creepy voice of an old man. He must have come to see what the ruckus in the basement was all about. Before he addressed Flame Princess directly he bent own and whispered a few words to a small creature by his side, who in turn made a strange quacking noise. The blue figure then stood and took off a certain golden crown from its head, leaning heavily on the doorway. "How you doing, hot stuff?"

Flame Princess was baffled; was he talking to her? The chubby girl on the floor who no one seemed to like? The same one who waited years for just one person to notice her? "W-wha…?" she stammered in utter disbelief.

Looking at the pools of water in his no longer top secret room and the soft glow from the princess, the demeanor of the old man suddenly changed that of disgust. "Wait a minute… You really are _hot stuff_, aren't you?"

"Yes, I-"

But he had already turned his white bearded face to his miniature aviary accompaniment. "Ugh, another one for the rejects. Why can't I get a good princess that I can actually marry?" He bent down once to retrieve his adorable pet and readied himself to leave. "Get out of my castle, would ya? And don't forget to lock the door on your way out. I can't have any more losers just waltzin' on in."

His words were now falling on deaf ears, as his guest was too infuriated to listen. _Rejects?_ How dare he be so rude to such royalty! He would pay dearly for this inadmissible crime, and she would see to it that his suffering was not ephemeral in any way. "Oh, so that's how it is?" With that, her capering hair fused with her face and separated into four individual spires. She removed herself from the floor and balled her fists. "I bet you wouldn't say that if your kingdom was nothing but a lake, you big jerk!"

It was then he realized his mistake. The old psycho fell to the ground in shear fear as the flames now dance in the around the secret chamber he knew he had met his maker. At an astonishing rate the room reached unbearable temperatures and he felt the mountain begin to tremble. "No! Don't do this to me, I beg of you!" He pleaded desperately, to no avail. "I didn't mean it! Please! I have a wife and kids who live in here and they need someone to protect them… Oh pleeeeaaaase… Plee-hee-heeeess!" (_AN: basically, he's crying like a baby.) _As the pleading melted into wails of sorrow, Flame Princess let out an annoyed caterwaul of pure anger and melded the circling flames into a sphere around her body.

"Screw your family!" Water droplets from the ceiling hissed in objection, and she cringed in pain. Getting out would be an almost impossible mission. "You should've thought of them before you messed with a fire elemental!" In a blitz of rage, fire and ice, the fascinating sphere expanded around the two of them and rapidly melted the borders of the room. Each time a flood of water extinguished one of the princess' embers a roar could be heard as the temperature swelled in intensity. The aged, out-of-shape psycho tried to fly up the stairs with his magic beard towards the nearest exit but the labyrinth was heavily collapsing upon him in gushing rivers. Noisy winter birds swam in the inundation and gave the man a quick hello as he whizzed by them. The Princess was not far behind.

"I will _burn_ this water along with you and your offensive comments!" _What nerve that guy must have_, she thought, _to think he could make such comments about my inferiority and get away with it_. Right behind him, the monstrous manifestation of heat sent upward an unbelievably hot conflagration in the shape of a groping hand to singe the edge of the elder's cloak. The extra arm eased a massive spike's grip on the wall, and it released itself from the rounded cave straight for FP. Losing her focus, she retracted her flames and barely dodged the missile. That wasn't the only thing she lost, however; when she turned her attention to a deformed window the elder was a good distance away, zapping beams of blue to propel himself further into the wintery environment.

_Wait, he's using magic!_ She hadn't noticed before, but the old man she who had just insulted her was a mage. Slowly she morphed down to a smaller size and hovered closer to the flooded ground, not believing what she had done. Unknowingly the seeker had ruined her chance at discovering a breakthrough. That mage now fleeing in fear might have known a thing or two about magic enough to help her be with her Finn. He might have known about something that could protect him from fire, or vice versa. If she had more control, she could have stopped him in the doorway of the secret chamber and asked him for his wisdom. There was absolutely no way he would help, now that he had been given the scare of his lifetime; which she had to admit how awesomely she kicked his saggy butt. Even so, Flame Princess proved to be more useless in the search than she had hoped for, her failure in finding treasure in the steamy plateaus and her failure to ask the ice wizard contributed to that notion. The Flame King's promise was now long forgotten in the cold, cruel reality of life.

"Oh Finn, I'm not too sure this will ever work out…" With that she let her fire fall to Ooo and sobbed white-hot tears in the melting snow.

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_AN: *Le gasp, will she give up on finding the solution? Stay tuned for more! Don't forget to review, as feedback is greatly appreciated._

_Did you think I'd give out her real name so early in the story? Ha. Don't worry, I'll tell you guys that in a later chapter. If you're wondering where all the places are, look at the map of Ooo on the wiki, 'cuz that's what I'm going by. Everything is real; I didn't make any of the north, south, east, west junk up, that's totally how it goes. Except for maybe the plateaus being right next to the Isle of Steam, I just guessed that from "Thank You"._


	3. Full of Disgust

_Note from the Author: The song written in this chapter is horrible and it is mine. It is just an example. Please disregard its horribleness. And no, her name is not Edana. Good guess, though. I'll probably say her name by chapter 6 or so._

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**Chapter 3: Full of Disgust**

"Ugh, don't go crying on me now." It came from nowhere.

Despite the sudden intrusion Flame Princess did not stop the soft flow of tears to inspect the disturbance. "A failure like me deserves to cry."

The owner of the voice floated lackadaisically over the princess' head, its melodious tone sounding somewhat familiar. "Look missy, I didn't send you to the Ice King for you to cry like the world's over or something."

"What are you talking about?" She gazed above her to reveal a vampire clothed in deep red, easing in the air with a nefarious instrument her hands.

A few baritone notes flew through the wind before a reply was made. "I sent you to the Ice Kingdom to push you in the right direction."

So _this _was the witch from the vaporous lands at the edge of the Fire Kingdom. It was no witch though, just a vampire with tricks up her sleeve and a preference for emotional bass music. Cold, wet grass bit into the young girl's skin, so she removed herself from the ground as she tried to piece the story together. The tears slowed to a light trickle. "Why would you want to help me? I already gave up anyway, so it doesn't really matter," she said, bowing her head.

"Of course it matters. Your problem's not gonna be fixed by _just_ some magical token or a wizard's spell." With a few more notes, the sauntering figure began to strum a song set in a minor key that seemed to manifest disconsolate emotions from within. "You know what you did wrong here, right?"

"Well, yeah, I couldn't control my anger... I ended up scaring away someone who could have helped me."

"And that's exactly what you'll be working to fix while you're looking for that solution of yours," informed the vampire, moving her fingers through the bass' frets. Her words seemed so simple and incredibly easy, but there had to be a twist somewhere in it.

"What if I don't fix it? What if I fail like I did this time?"

"Don't worry; you'll have a few more chances to get it right. And I'm sure you'll be able to handle that much without crying the rest of your flaming head off."

She turned her head towards the glistening pillars of ice she had recently escaped, stealing glances at the ghostly remains of the wizard's defiled pinnacle. What the newcomer wanted wasn't exactly what she had signed up for. Initially the young blaze was devoted to finding something or someone of magical persuasion that possessed the power to allow opposite elements to come into painless contact. In no way, shape, or form did she expect for a cantankerous, blood-sucking maniac to intervene and send her down a path to correct her morals. But there was no other plausible course of action in the current situation, as no place proved satisfactory to travel to besides home. "Alright," the royal teenager huffed after a few moments, "where will you have me go next?"

"Start with that forest over there," the vampire directed its victim's attention to the grasslands in which Finn lived. "I know a couple of squirts there who can help you out a bit." In the background the song she currently played ended with an abrupt screeching of the strings. "Sorry, I got to go squash some pesky bugs. See you around, candle girl." She took her leave opposite the direction of the grasslands, appearing to defy nature by gliding though the air without any obvious source of propulsion. Flame Princess reluctantly returned the goodbye to the fading figure in the milky sky overhead with a small wave beside her head.

Embarking on the short journey south to the grasslands, FP slowly began hovering lightly above the painful snow. There was no rush to be had, for many thoughts already crowded the mind. One of which was focused on the strange artistry of the transcending environment. In the midday sun, the abrupt change from whites and baby blues to greens and dapples of yellows was rather clandestine yet so lustrous. A peculiar thing it was for the climate to suddenly alter to empty rolling hills; even the temperature felt rather strange on her skin albeit it was such a tepid one. Quite comfortable to say the least, but still as biting as the arctic realm itself.

Another thought was buried by the new fauna. As the trek neared the desired forest, the singing of boisterous aviaries could be heard, and their fluttering games about the swaying grass held in her gaze. Insects crawled mindlessly beneath her dress, unfazed by the heat of the flaming adolescence. On the breeze butterflies danced in a myriad of calming colors. She studied each and every one of their festivities as she had done on the night before.

Lastly, a rather large section of her mind was occupied by the presence of her prince. Completely coming to a halt among the shrubbery, she gazed out at the castle built on a draping tree. Prince Finn was just outside it, practicing fighting moves with a servant that resembled the deceased baron. His hat was lying crookedly on him, and strands of golden hair to sway in his movements. After a few more bouts with the yellow creature before him he threw the hat on the ground, letting the rest of his hair to flow in the open. The princess gasped at his true appearance, baffled at how handsome he truly was. It was a complete juxtaposition to the goofy demeanor brought about when he wore the hat, and it gave her another reason to be fond of him. When she had first met him, she liked Finn because of his romantic song, silly nature, and persistence for her despite the odds against him.

But then a thought struck her: if he was so persistent for her, why didn't he come to the Fire Kingdom that morning to work things out himself? Had he lost interest in the dangerous beauty and longed for someone new? "Does he really not like me?" she said to herself in a soft whisper. It was entirely possible the boy had realized what everyone else saw in her and had decided the chase wasn't worth the prize… Or perhaps she was thinking too far into the matter. If he was practicing fighting moves, there could be a chance he intended to fight a demon so that he may hug her free of pain.

For the length of nearly five minutes she stood swooning over Finn's gorgeousness from her place at the bottom of the hill. During this time, the nearest bushes were set alight and were gradually sharing the flame to the forest like a fuse to a stack of dynamite. But the sound of crackling twigs and branches failed to reach the princess. She was far too enrapt in watching the training session develop into a comical tussle in the grass to notice. The boys began shouting battle burns to each other, all of which made no sense to the eavesdropper due to their nature in slang.

What she did notice, however, was the sound of words in the forest. Just a few meters away a chorus of spotted mushroom sang a joyful song under a moldy tree. At her distance the Flame Princess could not decipher the meaning of their words, but the tune was enticing enough to draw her away from her man. As she entered the thick forest she unknowingly caught more of the flora in flames and became ever closer to the bunch of fungi. In just one moment their words became evident and the teen understood what they were singing about. The song went a bit like this:

_Oh, master of all things smelly,_

_One by the name of Sir Nelly,_

_He's so nice, he's so nice, he's so_

_He's soooo nice!_

_He's way better than the king of ice!_

_He knows a bunch more too,_

_He knows the sure cure to all flues!_

_And mysteries as well! _

_If you have a problem,_

_Just come meet Sir Nelly!_

_He knows everything, everything, every_

_Everyyyyyything!_

_Oh…._

They repeated the chorus twice until each one of them took turns to sing a unique solo of their own at a slower tempo. Every verse went on to describe this legendary man known as Sir Nelly the Fragrant, creating a picture that depicted him as a wonderful, valiant, and all-knowing character, who-they insisted on pointing this out numerous times-smelled absolutely ambrosial. The whole arrangement was very interesting to hear. Its upbeat attitude was rather catchy to the extent where Flame Princess began humming the tune along with the fungi.

One of the larger Boletales (_AN: it's a type of mushroom, look it up_) took notice of the royalty standing in front of them and directed its friends to cease their caroling. It slanted its face upward at the audience with a hint of fear sparkling in its eyes, then raised a country accented voice that said: "I see ya done like our song, ma'am!"

"Sure, I guess. It's okay," she replied somewhat awkwardly.

"What can I do ya fer?"

"Does the knight you're singing about really know everything?"

"He _suuure_ does, miss!" said another, in the same peppy, country-accented tone as the first. "His greatness lives just down that granny-slappin' trail way up yonder!"

She followed the handful of beady rubbernecking across to a path that led deeper into the forest. With a final glance behind where she believed to be the direction her crush still was, the dame set off down the trail lacking so much as a farewell to the fungus chorus . Hopefully this person they over-embellished had the answer to end the girl's mission, so that she may waltz back up the hills to fall into her prince's arms without further delay. Enthusiasm quickened her pace and pretty soon she was travelling at an average car speed. The mushrooms in her wake attempted to win her attention with extended adieus coupled with put off tones, exemplifying how upset they were at the young dame's rancid manners. Even still, the notes of their song could be heard resumed in the distance.

The path was littered with foul smelling articles that increased in frequency as she traversed closer to the man. At first the stench was entirely bearable. However, once an olive tinted structure sprawled itself beneath the umbrous foliage, the stench worsened tenfold. The walls of this structure were comprised of rotting carrion and ancient discarded peripherals, all jumbled and tightly packed together. It was not a gorgeous sight to behold at all. Despite its horrid appearance, it managed to hold a presence of royal purpose.

Doubt surged in Flame Princess as she became cognizant that the trail ended at the structure's entrance. The fungi assured her one quality Sir Nelly possessed was a divine aroma. If they misconstrued the fetidness of his fumes, the possibility of other facts being incorrect as well was all too great. She debated turning around and looking elsewhere, but she was too compelled to end the search as soon as possible. Should she fail to gather any information of some kind, there was no known location she could turn to. And plus, the vampire had entrusted someone of knowledgeable significance in the timberland.

The blaze wandered through the door-which was left invitingly open-and immediately had to cover her nose, as the garbage scent heightened still. "Ugh-how much worse can this place smell! It's disgusting in here!" Sickeningly, the voice bounced off the walls throughout the dwarfed castle, into tiny arched passageways. The inside looked pretty much the same as the outside. It was decorated only with a compilation of putrid trash that was tinted a darker shade of olive, as if the inside had rotted longer than the exterior. There was one large foyer lit by glowing silver chandelier and five lesser dark hallways drifting into darkness. To her far right there was an incline to a second floor. It too was constructed from super-compact garbage, and because of this the upward slant could not harbor at least one stable step of a staircase.

Just as curiosity came out of its shell a tall, plump, absolutely hideous ogre leapt from the upper level and onto the floor in front of the living candle, kind rage bubbling off of his boil-infested skin in waves. Upon impact the ground spewed boxes, spoiled sandwiches, plastic objects and other junk into the air. Flame Princess was startled out of her red hue at the ogre's sudden appearance and her flowing hair became spiky for a short moment before the surprise faded away. The monstrosity tabbed on an ancient monocle on his left eye and tidied his stained apparel resembling that of a butcher. "Milady, will you please vacate the premises this instant?" Much unlike his fungal admirers his accent could be categorized as a form of posh British.

Take leave from this dump so soon? What failure had the princess committed to this time, so soon into the investigation… Instead of getting angry with herself, the hot-headed girl put a sock in it and collected a calm approach, as difficult as it was. "W-wait!" she stammered. "Aren't you Sir Nelly the Fragrant?"

A low-pitch jubilant chuckle sounded from the ogre's throat at hearing this nickname. In this case, it was rather contradictory to what FP thought of him. Regaining his composure he looked FP straight in the eye. "That's me alright. What the devil would you want from me?"

"I was hoping you could share some of your knowledge-"

"Absolutely not!" he snapped. "You'll get bugger all from me. I don't help twits like you who think my palace is filthy." Shuffling towards the door he extended a grimy hand outward. "Now, milady, please take your leave at once."

"This is important!" The sock that covered her anger was beginning to burn.

"At _once!_" The well-dressed ogre stretched a limb made of trash and grasped her firmly in a giant hand. He thrust the elemental entity out the small doorway, sending her flying into the forest outside. She landed with a thump but was on her toes in a flash of fuchsia, rapidly flinging embers his way and calling him names. However, the stench of burning carrion the balls of fire aroused gave her an overwhelming feeling of disgust that caused her to bend over and regurgitate a splash of lava. "It doesn't hurt to visit the library now and again!" The ornate door slammed shut.

Dusting herself, Flame Princess stood abreast and contemplated her next move. _Where in Ooo is the library?_ She remembered hearing about it one day when a scribe visited her palace to deliver a couple of tomes to her father. When she had asked him where the molten books had come from, he had replied "Why, the great library of Ooo, of course!" He had then left immediately for his study- to a part of the palace she had never been- and no more was said about the books, or why a scribe was needed to rewrite books that already had hundreds of copies. But the question remained: where was it?

She wandered around the forest for what seemed like hours with again no luck. Every corner was just a bunch of plants, flowers, and skittering squirrels. Once she came across a small cottage beside a farm but it hardly had the façade of a library. Or at least, that's what seemed to be the case. When at last she dubbed the search a fruitless endeavor she started down a winding path into the grasslands. By this time the sun was lowered closer to the horizon, radiating a neon orange glow in the sky. The whole day had been wasted in a pointless search, all the hours given to a crazy wizard and a foul ogre. Her pause at the sun was ephemeral, for a voice called out from behind her.

"Flame Princess!" It was the panting voice of Prince Finn. She turned around instantly to see her crush. He was running up the hill from the woods with one of his dog servants at his heels, and they both halted a meter from the princess. As their eyes met, Finn became a flustered mess and appeared to have forgotten what he had come for, causing a long and awkward silence between them. They stood there staring at each other for a few moments, before she tore apart the heavy blanket with her words.

"Hello, Finn."

"Uh, hey…" He glanced at the ground briefly, then skewed his head to the side. His body language told a story of deep thought. "Listen, uh, you might not want to keep your fire burning like that… You might get hurt…"

_He cares about me! How sweet!_ "Keep it how?" She wondered what he was speaking of.

Before Finn had the chance to recollect his fallen shards enough to reply, the yellow dog spoke up. "You started a wildfire, princess. Pretty soon people'll try to put out with water, which will mostly knock you out real bad."

Wildfire… Indeed a good portion of the forest was ablaze in her flames and had apparently been burning the whole afternoon. For some reason-and there was no doubt as to what it was-Flame Princess had not realized the damage she was inflicting upon the timberland. Come to think of it actually, she had felt a sense of growing strength with each passing hour but discarded it as nothing of any importance. "Oh." Not wanting to suffer the painful end the dog recently described, she withdrew the energy from the burning embers and the wildfire was no more. At the intake of a tremendous amount of energy the elemental brightened immensely, her own flame danced intermittently before subsiding. The damage already done could not be undone, of course, so half of the forest was left in heaps of smoldering cinders.

Finn on the other hand was staring in awe at her beauty. The shades of red infused with a backdrop of oranges made her seem like a goddess in his eyes. When she turned back to him and caught his awed stare she blushed profusely. "Please stop staring at me like that…" said she, voicing her slight discomfort.

"Sorry…" He shook himself and looked away, gaining a giggle from the canine. Another silence followed. "So, uh, what brings you out here?"

"I'm researching something."

"That's cool. Will you be okay from here?"

The offer hung in the air for a second as Flame Princess calculated what she could ask of him. One part of her said to keep him close by the rest of the journey. But that suggestion was quickly chased away by the thought of the task given by the vampire. If she was supposed to appease her anger issues she'd rather have them dealt with by her lonesome. That said, the logical part of her knew this was the perfect opportunity to acquire a chauffeur. "Actually, there is something you could do."

He looked at her expectantly. "What is it?"

"Could you take me to the library?"

* * *

_Note from the Author: What happens next? You tell me! Actually, no, don't tell me; I already have the next chapter planned out. But please do comment anyway, I'd like to hear feedback on this chapter! Was it awesome? Was it horrible? I know my song sure was. I wrote it on the fly, so you can't blame me for its imperfection. Anyway, next chapter will be sooner than this one came._


	4. Nostalgic Elucidation

_This chapter starts out in Finn's POV_

* * *

**Chapter 4: Nostalgic Elucidation**

_Finn_

"Sure!-I mean, of course." He won a few giggles from her. "I can take you there, it's not that far." Jake motioned hand signals in an attempt to give his brother moral support. The signals were nothing more than a bunch of thumbs ups and winks, so there was no overreaction from Flame Princess. She might as well have thought they were communicating in some personal language when she glanced their way. Finn shyly smiled in response and jumped onto the dog's back, before he grew too tall to climb. They began walking at an exceptionally fast pace in a direction away from the charred forests, the princess flying close behind with her arms spread like the golden wings of a phoenix.

The first few moments were entrenched in silence as each teenager and dog fixed themselves in personalized universes. Finn sat uncomfortably on his trusty steed with same goofy smirk and nervous sweating as usual. Talking to girls was never really his forte, but Finn was entirely capable of overcoming such a minor obstacle. He twiddled his thumbs during the moments they travelled in silence as if it bothered him no one was speaking to one another, and once he decided what to say to his crush his hands move to brae himself on Jake's scruff. "So, uh, what are you researching?"

"Something along the lines of magic," she said from her place low to the ground. Now that a conversation had sprung up there was no need to hang back, so the princess increased altitude and hovered nearer Finn. "A spell, maybe."

As she moved through the air he watched her with longing fascination. Even though all she did was glide a meter higher in the air, she moved so purposefully, so elegantly, _so beautifully…_ And the sunset was helping profoundly. Shaking his head, he pushed away his thoughts for later and brought himself back to the real world. _Wait what did she even say?_ He had been so focused on watching the inviting flames dance that he had forgotten what her reply was. It didn't matter what she was researching anyway; he could still offer a gentlemanly hand to aid her endeavors. "Can I help?"

"I'd rather do this on my own."

He suddenly realized what she planned to do. "Oh, so it's _that_ kind of research." Thoroughly disheartened, Finn stared at the hills ahead. He hoped he could have possibly spent the rest of his day on a midnight adventure with the dame he had set his eyes on, but appeared she obviously wanted to be enthralled by the same boring matters of edification as Princess Bubblegum. At times the staleness was endurable, but this late in the day made it something Finn didn't want to associate with.

Even more time passed before Jake nudged his brother in the side with an arm protruding from his back. He stretched his head closer to Finn's ears so that he may whisper words of wisdom, without hopefully alerting the girl. With a quick glance at Flame Princess he eagerly made his suggestion. "Dude, ask her out!"

"I already asked her out, remember?" Finn said in the same lowered tone, recalling the ordeal from yesterday and the second-degree burns that still tormented him this instance. When she left sullenly into the distance he had understood it to be the denial of his inquiry. He had surmised that she did not want to see him hurt, or to constantly be hurt by the water elemental she liked. "She said no."

"You can still try, man! All you guys did was hug and then she left. It's not like she actually said 'Finn, you're ugly and I don't want to date you.'" He attempted to impersonate the high-pitched feminine voice of the princess but failed miserably. His reasoning however made it through to Finn and evoked him to ponder the other hand, the atmosphere began to heighten in temperature, a pure sign that their private conversation was no longer private.

Flame Princess had swung a foot around to slam on invisible breaks and came to a burning halt. "Why are you whispering?" she looked at Finn and then turned to Jake. As their eyes met she held up balls of fire in both hands ready to strike. "Is he talking bad about me?"

"Princess, he was just giving me a suggestion! To me! It had nothing to do with you… mostly." Finn desperately tried to calm her down as fast as possible, before Jake had another reason to greatly dislike her. Surprisingly, the flailing of his arms along with his plea seemed to work. As Flame Princess reluctantly gave in, she let out a gruff sigh and a testy 'I see' and released the undulating waves of heat innocuously. In just seconds they were back on the trail to the library, but now at more brisk pace to keep up with the hot-head.

When she was the brief discord seemed forgotten Finn attempted to fulfill Jake's suggestion. Through his pondering-courtesy of Jake-he came to the conclusion that even though she had politely rejected him before, Flame Princess didn't show any sign that she _hated_ him. It was only logical that she would say yes to him. "um…" _How should I put this…_ without Jake's experience with talking to ladies, Finn would simply have to improvise. "When you're done researching magic, do you wanna maybe, you know, hang out or something? Like on a, uh, date, maybe?"

Clasping her hands together next to the gem on her chest she swiftly affirmed their conclusion. She looked back at Finn with eye that sparkled brighter than the sun. "I'd love to!"

"Great!" It was now official. Jake gave him a high five with his fifth hand and gave another wink of moral support. Finn couldn't contain his happiness; that one confirmation assured many days of worriless shenanigans in the future. He began daydreaming of it that moment, images of him and Flame Princess flashing in his mind; images of them sitting in the treehouse playing BMO's games, running around Ooo on adventures, and on the hills watching the sunset. Finn simply could not wait until her research was concluded so that he could spend time with his new girl…friend.

"That is, if I don't fail."

His daydream melted to a puddle of nothingness as the world regressed to being the same cruel place it always was. "What do you mean?"

The blaze veered nearer to Finn and grabbed his hand. Of course, Finn blushed goofily at the sudden the action and at the notion of holding her hand. Slowly the pain seeped into his brain and registered the contact to be incredibly hot, telling him to remove the hand before it was severely burned. It yelled at him, practically screamed at him while he relished her touch, until at last he retracted his arm and yelped in agony. The outburst made Jake take his eyes from the road. Finn looked up at her stoic expression a question rising from his snout. But then he realized what the girl was trying to do. She was attempting to tell him that she was researching how to overcome this barrier of agony in such a deliberate way that seemed to say "Don't follow me this time." Which, in reality it just meant in the nicest way physically possible, "Stay away or I will flippin' kill you."

Jake cut into touchy moment with "We're here!" and stopped walking. Shrinking down to his usual size he stood patiently in front of the half buried library waiting for the two love birds.

Flame Princess slipped through the air to the grass as elegant as always. Once she reached the ground she stood before the opening to sum up the appearance of the edifice they had brought her to, then looked back at Finn. Giving him a warming smile, she waved goodbye. "I'll come to your castle when I have finished." She turned for the large wooden door, making to open it but was interrupted by the hero's quick thinking of doing it for her.

"See you later, princess."

* * *

_Flame Princess_

Immediately at the door's feet there was a set of stone stairs leading to the lower level. The staircase opened to rather large clearance, proving the library to be far more extensive on the interior than exterior. Rows and rows of bookshelves were organized around the center of the cumbersome room to the very back, where the inconsistent order changed to a toppled heap of shelves forming something of a wall. From above the dying sunlight filtered in through small window frames, and the light dissipated perilously to a gloomy shade. Dappled between the lanes were modest stations furnished with wooden tables and moderately convoluted chairs. Occasionally a chair was filled by lonely turtle utterly engrossed in a pile of massive bland tomes. Not one of them noticed the fire elemental enter.

The first logical place to search in was the area designated to books about magic. Glancing at the categories listed at the sides of each bookshelf, Flame Princess wandered the library. Most of the categories were of little interest to her, bearing names such as science, medicine, children's, bigger children's, religion, fiction, good fiction, bad fiction, fan fiction, sociology, history, prehistory, after prehistory, pre-after prehistory… the list went infinitely on. Whatever the topic was, there were at least five separate bookcases chock-full of multi-colored books and tomes of all sizes.

"No, no, no…" said the teen as she sifted through the endless lanes. _How many genres can there be? _There were so many ridiculously named lanes that a feeling of misdirection haunted her ever step on the mottled gray flooring. Though when she passed a billowy white shaded man who greatly resembled a wizard, she knew she was relatively close. The sight of him brought her in front of the vast section she was looking for. "Here it is!" Someone in a nearby lane made a shushing noise at the loud interruption, though Flame Princess ignored them.

She turned onto the first bookshelf on her right and instantly a book caught her eye. Pulling it out for closer examination the young dame read the title "Fire Spells". What impeccable luck to find the proper book so early, after so much of her journey which had already ended in failure. It was a rather large compendium of sorts with perhaps thousands of pages in its contents, undoubtedly withholding valuable information of the magic of fire. Tempestuously she slumped her kindling body to the floor and flipped swiftly through the pages to a random part of the book, which happened to be chapter eleven.

Chapter eleven told all about various spells on the actual creation of fire itself-not at all helpful for Flame Princess. _Next chapter…_ Chapter twelve dealt with spells to counter fire creation spells, and how to quell a raging fire. Such information would only be helpful if she were looking to inflict caustic damage upon herself. The thirteenth chapter gave spell combinations to protect oneself against water. Very valuable information indeed; however Prince Finn did not appear to be a water elemental in her eyes any longer. The fact that she touched him twice in the lack of the usual pain that arose from water it was clear that her prince was just another living being who belonged to no element. She skipped a few multiple chapters forward to the seventeenth chapter, which appeared to describe…

In that moment the book was gone. It had perished in her blistering hot hands, carbonized to nothing more than a pile of ash. This had tampered with her anger levels a tad too much. The girl stormed to her feet and quickly stole another book from the shelves, not caring what thaumaturgy it depicted. Now with her full attention on the book itself she discovered it was ablaze immediately at her insidious touch. "What sorcery is this!" Another ignored shush. She watched the book burn as long as the previous one before it too was a collection of ash on the stone floor.

Since when did books burn? All those books her father had ordered from the scribe years ago never burned when a fire elemental picked it up or when it was dropped onto the volcanic ground of the fire kingdom… or even when one of the idiotic jesters clumsily dropped one in a lava pool. The books would always return in the same perfect condition as they were in the beginning. However, these books were another tale entirely. Perhaps one of them was fireproof and did not disintegrate. Frantically Flame Princess snatched each book one by one, each suffering the same incendiary fate. "Come on, one of these things has to be fireproof…" she pleaded aloud.

An annoyed monotone voice sounded behind her. "Of course they'll burn; you're a freaking fireplace!" It sounded like the Turtle Princess, someone she remembered seeing at the most recent sesquicentennial meeting of Ooo royalty, though she paid the testudine no mind as she continued to fly the books off their shelves. "Agh! That's totally inappropriate! Get out of here!" By now even Turtle Princess was perturbed, to the point where she hauled the nearest table and whacked the arsonist a couple times with it. Too agitated to put up with this nonsense, Flame Princess stared grimly at her attacker, grabbed the table mid-swing, and incinerated it as she did the books. The flames bit TP's stubby hands and pulled her into the inferno.

_ That ought to keep her busy for a while. _Advancing to the next previous aisle she changed her search from the books to the wizard she saw earlier. If she couldn't touch the books directly, then she had to get someone else who could, or at least knew them well enough, and a wizard fit that description perfectly.

The old wise man still stood in the same place she found him last, leaning against one of the towering wooden bookshelves with a book in hand. Little tufts of cottony gasses made up his cloak and his skin, symbolizing that he was a mage from the Cloud Kingdom, and by his posture he was aged beyond comparison. He mumbled while reading through the pages at an alarming rate, the pages appearing to spin along a turbine of glowing sapphire. From where she was standing, the cloud mage looked somewhat familiar as well as the Turtle Princess, only her memory of him wasn't as clear. Nonetheless, she brought her amber light in front of him.

"Hey wizard! I need your help," cried the princess.

It took him about ten seconds to hesitantly look in her direction, but when he did, the pages of the stopped their incessant turning and stopped glowing. Then the wizard opened his mouth and seemed to run his words on like an endless storm. "Hmm? Oh, would you look at that! It's the princess of the Fire Kingdom!" He closed the heavy book and threw it on the floor to free his arms for a bear hug. The royal teen did not shy away, for if it would make him want to help her even more just by sharing a hug, so be it. "Boy, I haven't seen you since you were just an itty bitty ember… My, my! How much you've grown since then. And you look just like your mother. You're just the spitting image of her! That, and a little bit of Ignatius, just a bit there in your terrible posture… Tell me, how's the queen been all these years?"

"She died." This was one thing Flame Princess deliberately never thought about. Her mother was long gone, ever since that one fateful day years ago. Although she was too young to understand what had occurred, through the subjects' hushed mention of it and her father's reaction each time the notion was brought into the palace, she knew what had happened was incredibly horrible. So horrible in fact, that it was one of the many reasons the young girl was locked up in a spell bound lantern. However, telling the mage that the queen of the Fire Kingdom died was a lie. It was simply easier to say she was deceased rather to explain what had truly happened…

The cloud wizard was bewildered out of his atmospheric embodiment at the frankness of her answer. To him the fact the girl couldn't care less about her mother was very unsettling. "Oh my, I'm sorry to-"

"Don't be." After all, she never really liked her mother. In the four short years she knew her, the princess found her to be as unlikable as she herself was, yet twice as difficult to put up with. There was always a time the queen caused arguments with the king that left him absolutely miserable. In addition to that, she chose not to directly associate with her child for reasons of age differences and substantial gaps in knowledge. "I don't have time for incompetent brats like you," she would say to Flame Princess when asked to engage in a friendly child's game. "Just wait until you're older… and smarter."

"Ah. Well, if that's how you feel about it, I won't bother. What do you need, kido?" He picked up the fallen book and replaced on the bookshelf.

Thinking back to today's events, Flame Princess knew exactly what it was she needed. Everything she encountered was destroyed be her curiosity despite her wishes. The chance to ask the first wizard from the Ice Kingdom was obliterated by fire, the forest was unknowingly carbonized, Finn's hand charred when she held it, and the tomes disintegrated before her eyes. Usually destruction was considered to be exceedingly satisfactory whenever anger and wariness came into play. But to have the have the destruction in each situation no matter what the circumstances was quite an unpleasant trait. Sometimes it was necessary to stand afar and analyze the scenario before any action is taken. So getting rid of the inevitable destruction that came with fire was the key to solving the vampire's quest as well as her own. "Is there a way to maybe make it so that I don't burn everything I touch?"

"Hmmmmmm…. Yes, there should be." He said, beginning the walk out of the library. "I believe I have just the thing for you." The girl followed in ready gusto and without procrastinating. This was surely the end of the journey, and idiotic journey that could have been avoided had the princess done it all correctly the first time. Surely the wizard of the Cloud Kingdom-the same inspirational man who had always come to her palace when she was a sprouting ember to cheer her up where the jester had failed-could solve her inquiry with something remarkably extraordinary. "Come with me to my lab, I should have everything I need to make the transformation." _Transformation…_ Yes, what he planned was something extraordinary indeed.

* * *

_Note from the Author: If you haven't heard already, the next episode feature the Flame Princess is "Burning Low", and it will air at the end of July. I know I can't wait to see how they bring her back into the show… The next one after that will most likely be "Ignition Point" later on, mostly because of its name. But don't count me for that; it's merely speculation._


	5. Ever Brighter

_Note from the Author: Sorry for the little delay in uploading this chapter, guys. I already had the next two chapters written, I just got distracted playing Skyrim (I am a gamer as well as a writer). I'm sure you understand. To make up for it, this chapter is especially long and is actually my favorite one in the whole fanfiction. I'll upload chapter six in a few days as well._

* * *

**Chapter 5: Ever Brighter**

The elder wizard of the Cloud Kingdom led her through the Grass Lands under the silver brilliance of a waning moon. They walked for a rather extensive length of time, over mossy crests and between insignificant valleys. No matter how far they travelled it seemed the grasslands went on forever. On numerous occasions the wizard-or Jeffrey, as he had instructed her to call him-would stop out of the blue to gaze at the screen of sky above, squint his eyes into twin slits set askew, then change direction slightly and continue onward. In one of his delays a great unseen force passed them by, billowing Jeffrey's cloud-like physique and wavering Flame Princess' flaming hair. It was then she realized the fallacy of their follies.

"Doesn't the Cloud Kingdom move across the sky all the time?" she asked her companion. It would make sense, as it wouldn't be called the Cloud Kingdom if it weren't made out of clouds, and clouds could be moved by even the slightest of breezes. Most things in Ooo were named for exactly what they were-with very few exceptions.

With a hand in his long, gossamer-like beard he turned to her, still gazing at the occluded weather. "Why yes, of course it does," came a preoccupied reply. He started toward the distant thunderhead to which he stared before stopping again to squint his aged eyes. It was perfect proof that he had no clue where he was going. "But according to my careful calculations, it should still be lingering somewhere in that area."

"So this whole time we've been going around in circles based on some silly calculation?" She couldn't blame him really; he was old and had probably lost his mind eons ago to the larcenous hands of time, which could have also been the reason why her father decided his services were no longer needed. Simple calculations such as two plus two may have become a tedious venture for him to humor himself with. Still, it would have been nice to go to the Cloud Kingdom for her transformation and return to Prince Finn as soon as possible, before the sun had time to initiate the following day. Blundering about in the dark was nearly unacceptable.

All that reached Jeffrey was the sound of her voice, nondescript in his preoccupation; the vague insult simply fluttered dexterously into the distance and passed his point of fallible concentration. "Ehm… (_AN: Ehm is like hmm and erm but a bit different. You know, that sound that old men make when they're thinking? That's it)_ It would be much easier if we were higher up than to look up from underneath. Try to see if you can find the flashing lights of a party somewhere…" Flame Princess inspected the clouds as well with her younger vision. Directly above the two was partially open skies and scintillating stars, half of the sky taken up by a large group of cumulonimbus headed south.

"You know what? We'll just fly up from here." The wizard inhaled a large quantity of oxygen to lighten his weight and began to float into the air like a balloon. "We'll have to walk a bit more, though the kingdom shouldn't be too far off," he said, muffled through bulging cheeks. On the other hand, the ember behind him readied to propel her body upward with a conflagrant explosion. Although she could fly off the earth to some degree, she could not reach the altitude of even low bearing clouds and fly horizontally without falling back to earth. Instead, she had to catapult herself vertically with enough force to rip apart even the hardiest of matter. With a swift outburst of fire she rocketed past the mage, tearing through the underside of the storm clouds and stopping abruptly to land atop it.

The surface of the storm was surprisingly congealed enough for Flame Princess to balance herself on. Its notably soft and cold temperament was uncomfortable for the young blaze to stand upon, and also dampened her feet like the wet snow of the Ice Kingdom. Not only that, the weightless air drained the vibrant saturation from her skin and hair. Taking in her new surroundings, she saw the light blue, rounded ridges that rose and fell as if mimicking the sprawling grasslands it passed over. Amongst these ridges towering thunderheads protruded the surface, dark patches blending with the dappled ebony sky. Altogether the ambience was too calm and serene for her to achieve any sense of comfort.

Moments later Jeffrey drifted through the hole she created from her rambunctiousness and landed delicately beside her, letting out the air in which he inhaled. "Beautiful, isn't it?" He fixed his draping white cloak and yanked out the uncomfortable wrinkles. "Now let's keep moving, shall we? Before we both fall asleep on our feet." The princess nodded in unreserved agreement and again followed closely behind him. It had definitely progressed to a later part in the night, to the point where exhaustion was just around the corner. They furthered the journey, listening out for the blaring of a raving party, albeit the difficulty of distinguishing between it and the crack of thunder.

As it turned out the actual location of their desired goal betrayed their own and their initial hopes. When they came to its edge half an hour later and peered into the expanse, they caught a glimpse of dancing cloud people and faint sounds of music on the next group over. "Ah! There it is!" Jeffrey's energetic personality began to show once more as he rambled on. "I knew it was close by, I just knew it! It was only a hop, skip and a jump away, that's all it was. Let's get you over there right away, kiddo. I have the best thing for your little problem, I do, but it might take a little while to warm up. We must hurry there!" He gulped another heap of air and grabbed a hold of Flame Princess' tangerine shoulders. Her touch didn't rouse a distressed reaction from him as she thought it would have, given that cloud people are made up of clouds, which in turn are comprised of water vapor. Either he felt it and refused to acknowledge it, or it simply did not bother him. From there the old man floated them to the Kingdom situated far above the dusty Desert of Doom.

Once landed, they passed the dancing people and the staggering strobe lights as Jeffrey shepherded her to his laboratory built inside a looming column of vapors. The building was a jutting arm of blue and white laden in shadow, leaning left, right, front and back as it reached for the moon. Other houses in the village were nearby, though not nearly as tall and crooked as this one. But through the window of every house it could be seen that the rooms were lit by the same colored spotlights used in the party outside.

Inside, he immediately left the side of the princess and fiddled with a wooden chest atop of a barely discernible table, pulling out trinkets and gadgets of various origins and speaking to himself about each one. Flame Princess stood watching him with anxiety near the doorway and twiddled her thumbs. She remained there thinking about Finn and wondering what the transformation would change in her until the awkward hum of his mumbling became something of a nuisance intruding on her thoughts. "How long is this going to take? I want to be done with it as soon as possible."

Still shuffling through the chest he answered her question absent-mindedly. "Oh, I don't know… Maybe ten minutes if nothing's broken or anything, maybe longer. I haven't used this equipment in ages." Through his search a small ball caught his interest and he carefully removed it from the trunk. "If you want, I can give you one of those Loopsie Doopsie magic balls that you love so much…" He held up the ball for the lustrous dame to see, swirls and sparkles beginning to bounce from its edges.

She recognized the figure instantly; however she terribly disliked what she saw. "Eww, no! I'm way over that baby stuff." It was a long time since she last heard of those little toys, a trademark of the cloud mage that he used to bring with him to devour her attention. These magic balls were enjoyable for a toddler to toy with, though in no way captivating for a teenager. They were a thing of the past that she was embarrassed to still know and wished to forget about them before anyone else brought them to the light of conversation with her beloved prince nearby.

"Ahh…So you're at the age where you're into princes, eh?" He turned to give the princess a lighthearted, accusing glare while flinging the unwanted toy to the furthest recesses of his laboratory, unlit by the colored spotlights.

"Definitely."

Jeffrey laughed a throaty laugh in response to this. "Hehehe, I knew it right off the bat! Young girls like you are always looking for their Prince Charming. Always daydreaming of the guy you could ever possibly get…" Turning back to the chest he sifted through its contents awhile longer before taking out an awfully dilapidated necklace festooned with intricate designs on the pearl shaped beads. "Excuse me for a second, dearie. You need to have this on." The elder walked over to his patient and proceeded to lace the article of jewelry around her neck. When the latches had been latched the beads displayed an aurora of colors centimeters from their surfaces. "Oh, what a perfect fit!"

She looked down and peered at the necklace to the best of her ability in order to scrupulously inspect the ponderous display, finding it mesmerizing to watch the psychedelic complexity twist around itself in a majestic dance. "What does this do, exactly?" she asked after a couple minutes of staring.

"It's too complicated to explain it with scientific accuracy, so I'll keep it plain and simple: there is an object that sends energy-for lack of a better word-out into the air. Another object receives that same energy required for the transformation, and then stores the energy somewhere else. The necklace acts as an intermediate between the sender and the receiver, and both sends and receives during the entire process." (_AN: I hope I explained that correctly._) He spoke rather swiftly and assimilated the words together so that it was difficult to interpret any meaning from the explanation. When he believed the princess understood his every word, he regressed to the topic he initiated earlier. "Now, if you don't mind me askin', what prince tickles your fancy? Is it the charming prince right here in the Cloud Kingdom that all the girls like, or is it the wonderful robot prince who loves to play with fire? What about that handsome Desert Prince that practically breathes evil? He sure is the muscular one of the bunch." To each suggestion she shook her head. "Ooh, or is it the Flame Prince from the alternate gender swapped dimension of Aaa?"

"What?" _There's a Flame _Prince_? Since when? _Flame Princess was in total shock. The inquisition that the cloud mage had thoroughly lost his mind was confirmed with the nonsense he was blabbering about now. It was remarkably peculiar to suggest that the land of Ooo had a sister universe that was its complete opposite. _Where does he even come up with this stuff?_

"Unless that could be considered incest since you _are_ technically in the same royal family…" he said, combing his fingers through his beard in contemplation.

"Actually, I don't like any of those princes. My Prince Charming is the prince of the Grass lLnds." Only one of the three princes he listed sounded remotely attractive to her. Though she'd never met him, by Jeffrey's description of him he seemed as alluring as Finn. She could definitely go for a muscular piece of man who would gratify her father in the realm of proper manners, that is, if he was the epitome of evil itself. However she noted that this was the prince of the Desert Kingdom, a province that was stoutly associated with the Rock Kingdom, a kingdom who in turn was engaged in a gruesome war with her own. Dating him would probably result in her father disowning her, so it was best she stay focused on the one she was sure was the best choice of the selection.

"Prince whose-a-what's-it? I'm sorry, but I'm afraid I have no idea who you're talking about." He walked over to a door at the back of the room, motioning for Flame Princess to follow suit. This new room contained a levitating circular platform made of the same material as the curious necklace, with four ominous totems fastened to it in the shape of a square.

"Prince Finn! You know, the one with the ear-topped hat and has a bunch of little yellow dog servants?" When she mentioned ears she made the gesture of two pointy ears above her head, and to illustrate dog she put a hand out to the side. "He's the one I like. He even asked to court me after this is all done!"

Delving into his rusty cranium he searched for the chap that fit her description. There weren't many; two at most. With common sense he eliminated the contrapositives and found his answer. "Oh, you must mean Finn the human boy!" Again he laughed, this time long and hard, almost knocking off his wizard hat. When he regained his concentration, he lifted his wrinkled arms and began casting a magic spell on one of the totems. "Heheh, he ain't no prince, dearie! He's a hero! And those dog servants aren't servants at all: they're his brother and they're just one dog!"

"Hero?" The only time she had heard that title was in the stories told by her parents about great fire elementals who had a intimidating lust for power. Indubitably these individuals were greatly commended in the Kingdom of Fire, due to the nefarious denizens of their culture. "You mean like the one who goes out and kills thousands of people to satisfy his thirst for blood?"

Alas, this was not the case. "Ah, I forgot that your family had a demented meaning for the word hero… It's simply amusing how misconstrued you are!" The wizard barely managed to suppress another throaty laugh as he finished casting a spell on totem number one. One of the insignias depicted on its exterior began to radiate as he did so. "No, Finn is the kind of hero who beats up evildoers with his brother Jake." With the declaration of Jake he shook a fist in the wind and contorted his complexion to that of discontent. "Glob darn that confounded yellow dog-. He also likes to travel the lands in search of adventures."

"Beats up evildoers…" she repeated. It all made sense. If Finn was a hero, then all those times he inflicted pain upon her were not because he was a water-elemental, but because it was his purpose to cause harm to evil people. An instinct so deeply ingrained wasn't so easy to neglect. She balled her fists and pouted the way an angry teenager typically would, with arms stark straight by each side. "That's why he tried to hurt me so many times! That boy has another thing coming if he thinks-"

"Now hold on a second, you're not evil at all! You're just really strong willed!" he said while kicking the back of the other totems until they reacted similar to the first, then returned to the first room with the junky chest. Flame Princess lingered in the doorway.

"How do _you_ know?"

Jeffrey merely cocked his head slightly toward her so that the lighting of the room emphasized the grooves and wrinkles on his face and perilously said: "Your soul says so." Some of the trunk's contents went soaring through the air as the cloud mage resumed rummaging through for some unnamed peripheral. "Plus I watched you grow up as a child so I know things you yourself don't. Like how your left foot always points inward when you throw a fireball, even when you're sitting down."

_True… _She had almost forgotten what exactly Jeffrey meant to accomplish on his trips to her palace so many years ago. Only a babysitter or a true stalker would know such facts as this about her habitual behaviors, and through memory the former proved truer than the latter. But that was beside the point. The most bothersome thing about what he said was the rigid verity of her non-evilness. Throughout her life Flame King had assured that she was one of the most ruthless cinders in all of Ooo, that no other princess could rival such prowess. "What about all those things my father said about me being an unstoppable force of pure evil?" That he lied to her to protect her from herself was an irking notion to consider.

"Things in the Fire Kingdom are substantially different. Ignatius probably just wants you live up to those standards." There was no doubt she appreciated the matter of the subject now, so he ended the discussion to further progress setting up the ritual. Unfortunately, his search within the wooden chest failed to be of any use. "It appears that the most essential part of the sacrament, the battery, is missing. You'll have to give me a moment to go downstairs and find it. Why don't you sit down on that chair over there? Please, make yourself comfortable! It's the least you could do while you're here."

"Yeah, I'll do that." She sat in one of the cottony chairs positioned beside the table and observed him waltz to a trapdoor under a window, disappearing as he jumped to the floor below. All she could do now was sit in a coveting daydream about her crush in wait for the old man.

* * *

_A Strange Call_

When he was sure he was well out of the earshot of the young dame, he reached for a cellular device in a concealed pocket of his cloak and punched a series of holographic buttons. It was a communication device of sorts, one matching designs from before the Great Mushroom War. After an enduringwait a brisk _"Hello?" _came from the other end of the line.

The wizard replied in a hushed tone, wary of being eavesdropped on by his guest. "Hey, I don't have much time to chat, so I'll keep it brief."

"_Okay. Lay it on me."_

"The situation isn't well. Not well at all."

"_What do you mean?"_

"From what she's told me, your benefits are plummeting fast."

It took the other mysterious person quite a while to realize what matter of business Jeffrey was referring to. _"I understand. Who is it? Is she there now?"_

"It's the princess of the Fire Kingdom."

"_How does she know…?"_

"I'm not sure, but if something's not done now, it might as well be over for the both of you. The princess is here for a special transformation-and when she's done, I'll send her to you so that you may take her out of the picture personally."

"_Alright. Don't do any harm to her though, got it?"_

He couldn't control the laugh that welled up from his stomach, so he let the bout pass before concluding the call. Its surliness didn't trouble him one bit, though it probably did not reassure the person at the other end. "Don't worry, I couldn't harm a precious flower like her." Closing the device he vigilantly replaced it in its proper reservation, sure of himself that the crystal clear message was received by his dear friend. He then plucked from the floor a rather large gem layered in dust and groped for the ladder in the darkness. Looking up he was duly startled to see Flame Princess poking her head through the opening of the trapdoor. "Yes, kiddo?"

"You wouldn't happen to have any coal or charcoal, would you?"

"Don't have any coal, but I have some charcoal leftover from last week's cookout." Resting the jewel on the floor he stumbled around before remembering he could utilize magic to shed some light on the gloomy basement. The lambency of electricity faltered at his fingertips and illuminated the piles of disorganized compartments. In the very back was the grill still crowded with fueling ingredients. He took one or two rocks of charcoal from the grill, knowing full well that Flame Princess should not consume too much prior to such a critical conversion, else risk acquiring an impurity that could cause chronic damage to her elemental quintessence.

"That's fine." She caught the rocks as he tossed each one, gulping them down without bothering to chew at all. If Jeffrey didn't know any better, he'd say the royal teen had not eaten anything for two days at most. "…Do you have any gasoline?"

"Don't have any of that, sorry, kiddo." He lugged the oversized crystal up the ladder and joined her on the second floor. Of course he also guessed what she would ask for next after failing to obtain any gasoline, so he put to rest the question for any possible liquid fuel of any kind in his possession. "No kerosene either. Both of those liquids are too dangerous to have floating around the lab, especially when my experiments tend to be rather….unstable. "

* * *

_Flame Princess_

His work on the installation was nearly complete, and soon it would be time could be rid of her terrible burden. In the meantime Jeffrey explained certain things Flame Princess needed clarification on due to her lack of knowledge of the outside world. He explained concepts such as the different biomes encompassed by the lands of Ooo and the strange creatures inhabiting each one, starting with the lost depths of the ocean. The information in which he presented was simply fascinating to attain, and the flaming girl found her impatience to be through with the conversion and revisit Finn the Human was temporarily lost to curiosity. All the while he placed the oversized crystal beside totem number four, adjacent to number one, and attached both a blue and red pebble to three and four.

"Everything is set to go for your transformation to commence," said Jeffrey at last. If you would just stand on that pad there I will explain what is going to happen." He paused for her to make her way to the center of the circular stone terrace, him blowing through a bizarrely shaped pipe in satisfaction. "Excellent! Now this will be very simple; no confusion to be had anywhere. This totem here," he directed her attention to the totem he first cast a spell on, "will take your fiery essence and store it in that red stone to your left, in case you wish to reverse the transformation. At the same time the blue stone will give you an entirely new element, one that doesn't burn."

"And which element is that?"

"It would be the only element that I have experience with."

Electricity. Fair enough, since fire and electricity shared many similar attributes. They were both full of light and energy, though one lacked the same connotations. "You're changing me to a lightning elemental?" It would be an incredible change to get used to, that is, if it actually helped her relationship with Finn. _Let's hope it does work._

"Yes ma'am! Trust me, it's the best kind of magic you could ever possibly dream of having! It will fix all of your problems in a jiffy, even the ones you never knew you had." He was absolutely ecstatic about her joining his realm of magic, it seemed. However, his encouragement didn't excite her any more than she already was. If this is what it took to be happy in life… then so be it. "Just tell me when you're ready to go and I'll begin immediately!"

"Ready," she replied, steeling her nerves as best she could.

"Okay! Here we go!" From there what happened next was almost too fast for the young blaze to comprehend. Balls of magic fluctuated from his raised hands, allowing for the insignias embedded on the totems to radiate with a terrifying gleam. Out of thin air the gleam formed a circle following the outline of the stone pad, connecting both the blue and red pebbles until they began to orbit each other. The mystifying necklace melded into oblivion and contracted around her neck. Exactly as Jeffrey said, the fire left Flame Princess and was very soon replaced by a jittery contour, sourced by the blue artifact and drained by the red. During the limbo between the elements, it was as if she didn't exist at all, and the strange tugging and jabbing feelings she received from the stones was gone.

As soon it had begun, it had ended. "Is it over?" Yet you should never assume when it came to the capricious nature of magic. For all she knew, something new could begin again and startle her from her wits.

"My, my! The transformation was an overwhelming success! Oh, this is absolutely magnificent!" He held up a mirror that seemed to have come from nowhere so that FP could examine what result the ritual had on her appearance.

Well, to say she had changed is an understatement. The transformation had metamorphosed her signature shades of fire had into vibrant shades of turquoise, matching the colors of Jeffrey's electrical magic. Both rubies on her chest and forehead were now resplendent aquamarine as well. Her hair was not a wavering flame but a spiky spire of emotion, as though it personified eternal anger. The limp strands that lay at either side of her face had become extensions to her hair as a whole, draping around the head like a miniature curtain. A deep cerulean headband separated it from the emotional barbs situated behind it. Her royal dress was a dress no longer, but a jagged-edged skirt topped by a baby blue shirt and a collared, sleeveless teal short coat, all ornamented with an electrifying design. Though the apparel of an elemental could be changed at will, this outfit she suddenly found herself in was tied to the manifestation that was not hers. It was temporary, and would most likely morph into the dress she always wore before the conversion. Under everything that had transmuted she was still recognizable as Flame Princess.

Jeffrey shoved the mirror into a bottomless chest pocket and pulled an organic object in its place. He outstretched his hand to the princess and offered for her to test her newfound powers. "Here, try to burn the leaf in my hand."

She focused all of her energy onto the tiny spot, visualizing an insignificant bonfire ravaging the organic simplicity of the , the only thing she managed to accomplish was force binding ribbons of electricity to harmlessly suffocate it without any trace of heat. In fact, the power that coursed through her felt oddly cold. _It's not burning!_ This meant that whatever her old babysitter had done to her may have just ended her tiresome expedition. "Thank you Mr. Jeffrey!" And with that, she left the psychedelic ornamentation on the floor, rupturing both floors of his facility and flew into the sky at top speed.

"Wait! There's more I need to tell you!" She neglected him, only caring about making it back to the treehouse. He cursed at her impudence for not listening to the important details at a relatively high volume, but by then Flame Princess was too far away to take notice.

In the air she felt free, no longer bound by the lack of oxygen that came from formidable altitudes. She went faster than she had ever gone before in a consistent and undeviating line, with the aid of the element of storms and her uncontaminated high spirits. Not even her famishment after having only a meager meal in days did not slow her down. She was going _too_ fast, for when she realized that she had passed a mountain range headed in the wrong direction, changing course was a mistake. She veered to the right and lost control of her path, the excess energy forcing her to travel in a zigzag pattern, barely missing the pinnacle of a mountain. The capricious pattern was exceedingly disorienting, bringing her inevitably closer to the ground, but she was able to angle herself in the direction of the grasslands nonetheless. And at the speed she travelled, the treehouse materialized before she knew it was there, and she crash landed in the least majestic way possible through the window of the second floor. Crashing broke her line of focus, causing her to somersault over the table in front of Finn and his brother and coming to a halt upside down at the wall.

"Hey, I just fixed that window!" The dog raised a spoon which he had been using in aid for the consumption of a frozen substance to wave it forebodingly at her intrusion.

No one paid him any mind. Finn put his tub of the frozen substance on the table in front of him, rose from the couch to inspect the fluorescent meteorite that crashed into is living room and discovered it was a person dazed into confusion. But he didn't recognize the person, as thoroughly elucidated by the question he asked next. "Oh my Grod! Lady, are you okay?"

His voice wrenched her from the dazeand she replaced her manifestation with an electrical fire, reconstituting top with bottom. Apparently she hadn't noticed them relaxing on the couch, nor did she realize she broke their conversation prior, and was slightly embarrassed that they had seen her colliding clumsily with their floor. "Finn, it worked!" The amorphous entity then manifested back into her new humanoid form, spiky hair and all.

The hero seemed surprised that she knew his name. "Do I know you or something?" How upsetting… She was a stranger to him.

_What?_ "It's me Flame Princess!" For the life of her she couldn't understand why he would ask such a question. When she looked into Jeffrey's cloud mirror, she had gotten the perfect view of herself. Sure, much of her appearance changed to someone else's, but in that mirror she at least resembled her old self. Also, there were plenty of attributes that had not been touched by the transformation; she still acted like Flame Princess, she still sounded like Flame Princess, and her cute little face was still looked like Flame Princess.

Obviously she wasn't Flame Princess to him or… Jake, was it? It must have been Jake who said, "Dude, you look totally different!" It didn't sound like Finn, though the bright light bulb didn't check to see if it was his mouth that moved to utter those words.

Twisting herself around she scrutinized her appearance up and down to double check. Yes, it was as she predicted: in her new clothes _Storm_ Princess resembled Flame Princess in almost every achievable way without doubt. "I don't look _that_ different…"

"You're like all blue and stuff," said her crush. If all that hindered him from recognizing her as his princess was the difference in color, then the boy must truly be thickheaded. Actually, looking down at his attire she realized the human was not in his ordinary blue shirt and shorts as well, and was in fact dressed in a fuzzy red suit. "What happened, exactly?"

"I'm lightning elemental now." For proof she lifted her hands above her head and shot bolts between them. The jittery bolts then expanded energetically to the dimensions of the wooden room, drenching them all in a dazzling, pale blue light. Finn watched her amazing divination play before his eyes with gasps of awe, even shouting 'shmowzow!' in surprise while his brother shouted 'radical!'. He knew now that the blaze he knew yesterday didn't carry the same type of calefaction, but what she wanted them both to know was whether or not she carried the same hazards, whether he would combust in hungry embers at her touch. "Give me your hand."

"Which one, the burnt one or the non-burnt one?" Finn replied, as ridiculous and goofy as ever.

"It doesn't matter." The girl impatiently stole one of his hands regardless of its condition and grasped it firmly in her own. He didn't object, and wordlessly returned her grasp in anticipation for the answer of a lifetime. Standing silently for him to thoroughly experience the entirety of her simple yet unfamiliar contact, she looked at his eyes to register if they carried some form of affliction. They carried a certain emotion that was indiscernible for the princess to read. "How does it feel? Does it hurt you?" she asked innocuously.

"It feels like a dull buzz through my fingers." This made her smile from ear to ear beyond the limits of her mouth. The emotion in his eyes was revealed as pleasure to her, for she assumed the 'buzz' meant the contact with a lightning elemental was a minor titillation. He didn't let go of her hand, despite proving the point that fire had no role in Flame Princess' essence, ironic as it was. She didn't want let go of his warm hand either, for in this new body everything was unusually chilly. "So, uh, I guess that means we can hug now?"

"Yes." A hug was certainly better than a handshake and would definitely aid in restoring the heat her ravenous body failed to generate. Releasing their hands from the grip they embraced each other in a deep hug, closing their eyes unconsciously. _So warm…_ thought Flame Princess. His body heat practically melted her in his arms it was so inviting and comfortable. And it still managed to surprise her that she was able to feel heat, when as the daughter of conflagrations, heat didn't feel like anything at all. They hugged for a few chimerical, drawn out moments until Jake, who they had both forgotten and was diligently eating the frozen substance in his hands, made a strange sound in the background. Then they let go and Finn put a now freed hand behind his head, blushing madly.

"Finn, are you sure you're not getting hurt or anything?" Jake asked, swinging the spoon around in suspicion. When she glanced at him he looked incredibly plump and lazy spread out on the couch. Certainly not the attitude of a proper royal servant. His lackadaisicalness verified he was merely the brother of her prince.

"Yeah man, everything's fine." Finn turned to his brother in the effervescent mood given as a gift from their hug. He and the princess both smiled as if the fruits life bore couldn't get any sweeter. Nothing seemed to be the matter with their embracing, nothing that would give anybody the suspicion Jake had at the moment. "Why?"

The canine slumped further into his seat and stuffed a spoon full of his strange treat into his mouth. "I don't know, man… something seems a little fishy…"

Of course, the two dismissed his apprehensive inquiry and continued to bask in each other's presence without hesitation. If they hadn't already hugged Flame Princess would have suggested that they hug once more, for the previous one did not provide her with enough heat and she was left a frostbitten sensation. Instead, she resorted to requesting information about their next activity. "So what will we do next?"

"Actually," he started while plopping himself on the couch with FP not far behind, "Jake and I were having some ice cream before we went to sleep for the night. It's getting kind of late." The adventurer motioned to the half-empty tub that sat on the table and the one Jake was currently stuffing his face with. His news disheartened her little; after all she went through on this long day she hoped he at least had some romantic activity planned for them to engage in to suitably conclude her eventful journey. Evidently Finn caught her slightly disconsolate attitude and attempted to cheer her up with more news. "But hey, tomorrow we were going to explore the Spooky Forest. You can come with us if you like."

That sounded adventurous and full of peril, nothing short of what she supposed the hero could handle. Yet there was something he failed to mention; before she went into the library he had asked to take her out on a date, or to court her, as how her father explained such behavior on royal terms. That invitation was given to her merely three hours earlier and was still fresh on her mind. With the development of a completely different activity Flame Princess was sure he had forgotten everything he said. "I thought you were going to court me."

His reaction was to blush and laugh embarrassedly, and to be nudged by a dog that grinned and raised his eyebrows. "Hah, yeah, that too."

"Maybe you should feed her ice cream. Or better yet spaghetti, like you did with Princess Bubblegum…hehehe," bantered Jake. Another spoonful of the stuff and he realized his container was depleted of its contents, much to his disappointment.

This simply left the blue candle wondering what exactly it was they were enthralling themselves with. "What's ice cream?"

"Ice cream is this really delicious treat that Jake and I love to eat. You should try some, it's really good. You'll love it!" Finn picked his barrel and spoon off of the table and handed it to his girlfriend, who then examined the consumable with wary eyes. Reluctantly she used the utensil to gather a rather small amount and proceeded to dip it carefully in her mouth. She immediately spit it back out and sprayed it across the floor, making sounds of disgust in the process. To her, the taste was cold, bitter, and vile, an outright disgrace not to be put on one's tongue. "Or not…"

"That's the second time I've ever heard of anyone who didn't like ice cream!"

"What was the first?"

"Well…" She had triggered a focal point of reminiscence in the audacious human. He began to indulge in a lengthy tale involving an ancient frog, three outgrown plants, and rambunctious evil piglets. The tale embellished his and Jake's heroic deeds to the point where it made them seem like robust, battle-hardy champions. He privileged the princess, who hung zealously to his arm throughout the storytelling, with the irrationality of his wonderful story, all to explain the first occasion where they encountered ice cream haters. Occasionally Jake would add his two cents of the adventure, expanding on situations Finn failed to adequately describe and declaring useless things that just made the narrative hilarious. Altogether the story was as fascinating as the cloud mage's informative lectures about the whimsical land of Ooo, and when it was over she urged him to tell her more stories of which she believed were fictional.

Flame Princess clung to his arm in effort to subside her ache for warmth on his body heat. During his third tale she conjured the idea to win a hug from her prince, and interrupted him to say, "It's awfully cold being a lightning elemental…" _Hint, hint._ Given that this had nothing to do with a tale about discovering stolen apples, Finn looked at her adorableness on his arm and offered to swing an arm around her shoulders. Though he didn't follow the hint that that was what she had wanted from him in the first place.

Their cuddling seemed harmless at first, but its indiscriminate effects slowly made themselves noticeable. Just as Finn was illustrating him, Jake, and an elephant named Tree Trunks solve their farfetched mystery, his words became a gibberish slur of stammering. She looked up at him and saw that he was beginning to shake uncontrollably for some unexplained reason. For the ditsy person he was it appeared as a normal action to her. Until his shaking began to look painful and his brother freaked out, the young dame was not concerned, merely intrigued.

"OhmyGlob! OH, MY GLOB! You electrocuted him!"

At closer examination the volatile entity discovered shocks of electricity lacing themselves around Finn's shaking body, similar in fashion to the bolts that surrounded the leaf in Jeffrey's laboratory. In spite of her attempts to prevent harm from coming to him it had happened anyway. The ultimate solution to this kerfuffle was yet to be determined and seized. "So… it was for nothing?" The fact that her quest to find this ultimate solution had not fully been consummated and the fact that Jeffrey's promise had so blatantly been broken angered her beyond the point of reconciliation. Jumping from the sofa she let her form expand into a menacing figure of malice and screamed absolute bloody murder.

The scream was so earsplitting, so pain-filled, so horribly stomach-churning and vile that Jake shrank down to the size of a bug in sheer fear. "Oh man, she's probably gonna go kill somebody!" He tried to stir Finn from his seizure-like fit but without any success. "Finn, you okay? Come on, buddy, speak to me!"

_He said it would fix _all_ of my problems! Not create new ones!_ She exploded through the closest window, which just so happened to be a window that was not already broken, and zipped into the air with as much control of her direction as she could handle in her enraged state. From this flight through the sky she didn't arouse as much satisfaction as she had last, although her anger gave her the pleasure of warmth in the cold air. In no time flat the familiar bulging of the Cloud Kingdom rose in her sight, and on arrival she tore through building upon building in an attempt to find Jeffrey's laboratory. She didn't care about any of the threats made from the cloud people she displaced or the frightened looks some of them gave her. It wasn't like anyone had ever given her similar responses before.

"Jeffrey!" she shouted at the top of her metaphoric lungs. She spotted the wizard standing alone in front of his abode as if he had been waiting calmly for her to return to him. Such a notion was eerie to consider, but Flame Princess confronted him with her fury nonetheless. Circling around him she gradually slowed herself from the speed of light and took on the form of an angry giant. "You only made things WORSE! I still can't touch my prince without killing him first! CHANGE ME BACK NOW!" It wasn't entirely true, since she was able to hold his hand hug him without so much as an agonized reaction. Why she had so suddenly electrocuted him after the passing of time was unknown to her.

What he replied wasn't the most situation fitting-response. He puffed nonchalantly on his pipe and gibbered on at speeds no one could comprehend. "Most impressive, dearie! Your skill with this new element is simply astounding! Usually an elemental with inexperience of newly acquired powers is indubitably incapable of exponential growth or immense displays of power. But you… Dear me, it's wondrous to finally see your potential with my own fallible eyes!" Good ole Jeffrey, always with his overbearingly positive attitude.

"NOW!" In any other situation this wouldn't have upset her. She brought her hands together as if she was to fire a flamethrower and half expected one to originate from their clasped hands. Instead of a flamethrower she powered a laser in the direction of old man.

Regardless ofhis elderly physique he was able to dodge her laser bouts with great ease and with an eager approach. "Certainly, certainly." He dashed into his facility and swiftly gathered the same artifacts he used on her before. They hadn't yet been dumped into his junky chest and were still lying haphazardly in a corner of the ritual room. "Ah, If only you wished to stay like this; you'd make a fine apprentice. We'd have such wonderful days studying the arts of pure energy."

Knowing what came next, the luminous girl allowed for her electrical embodiment to be downsized so that she may fit in the area designated for her extraordinary transformation, still seething with rage. The four totems looked the same as they had an hour ago, though she did notice in one of them a pinkish-purple stone ingrained in its lower half, a stone that had not been there before. The princess regarded it as a part of her imagination, something that did not exist where she thought it did.

"Are you ready?"

She put on the psychedelic necklace. "As ready as I'll ever be."

"It might hurt a little this time." Not as much as she had already hurt Finn. Pain like that is insurmountable and could not be rivaled, and she had felt the same pain when she reached for a favorable objective and received a lashing in return. If she stayed as she was that's all she would give to Finn and that was certainly not what she wanted, even though he seemed able to endure the pain. He couldn't do so for much longer without a dreadful collapse.

Jeffrey began the counter-transformation and the ritual went in reversed order. The blue stone stole her electrical charges and the red returned her re-appropriated powers of fire. In limbo the feelings the stones arose were again gone as they should have been, all to be expected. But what she didn't expect to transpire next was to be shot by the purple stone and the sensation that ensued. "Oww!" It hurt worse than contact with water or ice did to a fire elemental and even caused her to lose consciousness. And in her unconsciousness she fell head first into the gaping hole created in her earlier rush, down toward the anxious emptiness of the desert.

"She's on her way…"

* * *

_Finn_

It was a while 'til Finn came to. When he opened his eyes he anticipated to be graced by the presence of her beautiful sunshine, gazing at him expectantly for the assurance of his wellbeing. Ooo's deity did not grant him that endowment. She was gone, and there was no trace of her attendance save, the newly broken windows from her entering and exiting. "Flame Princess? Jake, where'd she go?"

"She flew out the window screaming bloody murder!" Finn ran to the both windows, not knowing which one was the one shattered upon her leave. This time however she did not have a trail of blazing grass in her wake because she was no longer a fire elemental, at least to the best of his knowledge. She didn't bother to entrust him with the tale of her alteration, where she went to have it be done and who she talked to do it for her. That made it all the more difficult to track her down.

"Do you think she'll be okay?" He turned to Jake for reassuring reply, hoping whatever he could say would calm his nerves.

"As evil as that girl is, I'm pretty sure she can handle herself."

But it wasn't as consoling as he thought it would be. Perhaps this uneasiness could only dissipate if he had concrete evidence that she survived whatever it was she had gotten herself into."What if something bad happens to her? What if…" There were a plethora of things that could have ensued, and in that imaginative mind of his he didn't like any one of the possible outcomes. One thing was for sure, he couldn't let his new girlfriend be sentenced to a life in oblivion, forced to the brink of destruction, damned for all eternity, or maybe even worse. He snatched his forest green backpack from its spot next to an unused pair of boots. "Grab your gear, Jake, we're gonna help Flame Princess."

"We don't know if she's in trouble, let alone where she is!"

Not even Jake's instinct to resort to panicked ambiguity could hamper his progress, and he was out the window to solve this latest mystery-if one could call it that-performing skillful front flips on the way down. "Bye BMO, take care of the treehouse while we're gone!" Jake had no choice but to pursue his best friend.

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_Note from Author: What happens to FP? Who was that mysterious person on the phone? Stay tuned for answers! This is where I think it gets interesting…_

_And again, I will upload chapter six in a few days, for the sake of keeping the suspense, if everything goes well this weekend. Despite how much the plot of my fanfiction doesn't follow the show I will still continue writing!_

_Comments_

_Jubernal: That specifically won't be for awhile… but be patient, I'll write it soon enough._

_Tsuki Shikon: I'm glad to hear my vocabulary is helping you learn new words. Hopefully it will continue to do so. And I hope you had a wonderful birthday!_

_x-rinkai-x: Yes, this is my first. I've written other stuff, just not fanfiction._

_Thank you everybody else for your support! I don't know why, but last chapter received a lot of attention._


	6. Displeasures of the Desert

_Note from the Author: Did the last chapter keep you at the edge of your seat? I know a few of you wanted me to update earlier than I did… Well, I waited for this one on purpose._

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**Chapter 6: Displeasures of the Desert**

The Desert of Doom greeted her with open arms. Shining in the night sky, a falling star could be seen from the furthest reaches of Ooo's kingdoms, no doubt mistaken for what it truly was: the limp body of Flame Princess. Her landing created an enormous crater eroded deep into the parched earth, disturbing many discarded carcasses of tusked creatures and bristling flora. It was immensely debilitating for an unconscious being like the princess to impact the ground with such force and resulted in prolonging her coma. Fortunately the pain it would have wrought was not felt in her state.

Throughout the remainder of the night and the bulk of morrow she lay at the foot of the abysmal scar, untouched, undiscovered, and unknown by the rest of the world. It wasn't until the day afterwards that a mysterious figure upset her nearly inescapable slumber and carried her out. Whoever the figure was they were terribly careful not to cause any more harm to one in dangerous condition, and even obliged to lie her down in a comfortable cart filled with burning firewood. The soothing sensation of lying in a realm fire penetrated the groping void that filled her mind, slowly waking her up. It did not however fully lift the heavy drowsiness, and left her drifting in and out of awareness.

In the brief moments the drowsy spells were lifted ever so slightly by the annoyances of movement, the teen took notice of the sound of a dreadfully bored person whistling in the wind. Desert scenery passed them by, bleak and odious to her as the Ice Kingdom. It was a dull sight to see with rocks, cacti, and ancient ruins sparsely littered here and there and she fell rather peacefully back to sleep. She then dreamed she still sat wrapped in Finn's arms, listening to his adventurous tales as if the previous venture had not failed.

Hours later she was reawakened by the troubling cacophony of quarrelling and the ceasing of the bumpy road. Through tainted vision she was able to identify a familiar winged creature and the puzzling figure, this time only distinguishable as a blob of unnatural pink. Flying in the air above them all, the winged one could be recognized as the tolerant vampire twice met on Flame Princess' devious journey. Their voices were muffled to her ears and their words were a bunch of slurred nonsense yet fueled with endless hate. There was a crashing noise, and the haze of her vision worsened. One of the two quarrelling figures before her attempted to snatch the cart of firewood, but was almost immediately interrupted by the other. They gave warning, swung at their opposition, and drove them off. And the ride continued.

Next thing the princess knew nighttime had fallen once more, a group of burly men with piercing emerald eyes most likely being the reason for her sudden awakening. Chatting was heard, calmly mannered and duly professional. The pink blob let the men take possession of her carted bonfire and proceeded to vacate into the desert. They weren't nearly as careful dealing with the task of carrying her limp body, tossing her roughly between them as they made their way through the Desert of Doom. Somehow the young blaze did not wake long enough to react to the boorish treatment and allowed the men to continue carrying her rigorously in their callous hands. She was tossed some time later into twigs and branches inside a cave of sorts, with the entrance closing behind her.

It was only a matter of an hour that Flame Princess was able to fully become aware of the situation. She lay in a horribly constructed flammable bed in an empty room that was quite the nuisance. Nothing but the bed and the candle girl furnished the room, and it was only lit by her weakly excited flames. It was the cell of a prison, and she was its prisoner. "What is the meaning of this! Let me out!" She beat on the boulder obstructing the entrance. Lodged tightly through the opening, the boulder would not give in to her feeble attempts. "Do you know who you're dealing with here? I'll see to it that you all burn!"

The boulder shook and alarmed her from her feet. It spawned the same eerie green eyes as the burly men who had carried her to this prison and spoke in a startlingly deep voice that shook the very skeleton of the cave. "Yes, we know who you are; you are Étoile Soleil Arianne (_AN: Pronounced Eht-wal Soh-lay Are-e-y__ah__n_), Princess of the Fire Kingdom, the prized daughter of King Ignatius. You are a great asset to our winning the war, all thanks to the generous member of Ooo royalty who brought you into our custody." War…

The war between Fire and Desert was a nasty one, one that claimed the lives of many elementals during the tedious battles that ravaged the southern lands of Ooo. What had started it was a petty dispute between Kings over a minor strip of land of very little value and of almost no use to either side. But when the time came to decide who had ownership of it, the end of the argument was never heard. Really the princess could not understand how, in all of its pettiness, it had snowballed into a full-fledged war where deceitful lies were spewed by political figureheads to encourage their people to fight unconditionally. Now it had claimed the freedom of Flame Princess and restricted her from fulfilling her. _Ugh…_

Her earthen elemental guard continued to boast in her face. "We have informed your father of your presence here, and when he arrives we will force him to give to us what is rightfully ours in return for you, making us the victorious superiors!" A laugh was expected, though none came. He simply closed his eyes as he had been doing earlier and chose a life of ignorance. His smugness was incredibly bothersome and gave her enough fury to fire a volley of fireballs at him. They did no damage to him, of course, due to his incombustible exterior. Despite this fact she clung to the belief that all things burned, and this dunderhead was one that burned at a higher temperature. However the impact had drained much of the energies from her and left dying embers to surge weakly outward.

Someone in a nearby cell raised their voice above the hissing thunder of the fireballs. "Listen girly, you can't burn rock; it's impossible! Just give it up and rot in jail like the rest of us."

His comment was like a meal of fossilized carbon with a side of appetizing petrol. No, she will not succumb so easily to failure, not until one last adequate chance was given dislodge the cheeky boulder. "There has to be a way…" Perhaps there was a way to increase the temperature of her incendium tenfold… a way of utilizing the sliver of energy left inside her when the counter-transformation was so painfully interrupted. Reaching deep within her body the trapped dame mentally tugged at the power. With it firmly in her grasp she held her arms up once more and forced the energy to meld into the flames that spiraled away from her, making them appear white-hot. It was hot enough to stir a reaction from the guard, but not enough to melt him. Fueling it even more with the extract of pure energy only depleted her reserves, fatigued her prowess, and perturbed the doorway's obstruction.

His oculi opened again to glare menacingly at Flame Princess in her spot of the cramping cubicle. "Cause any more trouble and I'll personally dump you into the nearest oasis." Getting saturated in water certainly wasn't on her to-do list and definitely not worth the risk. If she lingered in the pool's depths for too long her blazes would be forever extinguished.

So the princess slouched on the bed in utter defeat. _It's over…I can't do it…_ she thought to herself. There truly was no way out of this predicament. After she was so close to solving the issue between her and Finn and gaining control over her anger to please the vampire, everything crumbled apart into a vexing heap of distress, and it wasn't for the first time, either. Something acted as though deliberately, working against this new romance to prevent it from budding any further… Maybe the Cosmic Owl did not want the two teenagers to fall in love, maybe it just wasn't meant for anything to work between them. Maybe he was just protecting her from a future heartbreak twice as wrenching as this one, saving all of Ooo the trouble of dealing with a rampant horror of destruction. She would just have to cope with losing the stately prince that strolled into her palace to serenade her and win her heart, because everything that came with cherishing him entailed paying a heavy price.

What next? Did she just allow herself to be traded over to her father in exchange for the useless strip of land that had nurtured feelings of malice between the two provinces? After the hostilities died down considerably it was possible she could pursue the hunky Desert Prince. A ruffian such as he would probably be just as good a boyfriend as Finn could have been. But in the short time she was with him she knew there was no one like Finn. Absolutely no one in the entire world could even come close to rivaling his optimistic, pleasurable, _bombastic_ personality. Finding someone else would be another fruitless search. In short, she had no clue what to do next.

Sighing, she rested herself on the bed and let her conflicting thoughts lull her back into an exhausted snooze. As troublesome as it was she managed to sleep deep enough into the next day. Her dreams were an unnerving combination of her confusion and haunting stares all around her, as if the Desert Kingdom was constructed entirely out of nosy earthen people that intruded on one's privacy. She tried to burn them as she did with the guard at her door, only to find that it duplicated the amount of prying eyes floating in her dream. Although it was nightmarish in nature, the dream was eventually forgotten and transcended to the illusory abyss.

Morning came with a continuous beeping that rang in reverberating echoes through the rocky barriers. In the cavern, Flame Prince found that her sense of hearing was harder to understand due to the error the sounds were drenched in. So in finding what had sourced the loathsome intrusion, it was difficult to surmise that it came from a cell of the captive who demeaned her futility. And in turn, it was responded to by the same person. "J.J., shut your trap!"

The beeping didn't retaliate and stopped completely, but someone else did from a cubicle on her… right, was it? This one was clearer yet increasingly timid to the point where the captive faltered in uttering his sentences. "Grimby, I-I-I think he's meanin' tuh say we got visitors." A profoundly accented tone was strung in his words like that of the homeless peasants that inhabited trivial locations of the desert. Though the one named Grimby had a voice similar of similar persuasion, it was more noticeable in his.

"All of you, shut up!" It was another booming voice from outside, its owner speaking authoritatively and with purpose. No doubt it was the man responsible for overseeing this level of the prison. "The only one with any visitors is the princess." Time to be handed piteously over to her father and be the reason why they lost this ridiculous war. The news of a 'visitor' made her remove herself from the remains of the bed and wait in anticipation at the edge of the room. She stood there readied to be burdened into new a life dwelling in humiliation.

"What?"

"You've got a visitor, maggot. Make it quick," the captain blurted, stomping off to an unseen room. Seconds afterward the guard securely wedged in her cell's doorway opened a gaping mouth of feldspar. This was a ripe opportunity to discover the visitor was not an escort to carry out orders of diplomatic importance, because this apparently did not surface as the meaning for 'visitor'. No, the visitor was surprisingly the center of her problems as well as her happiness, someone who should have been there given the relations between them and the prisoner of war. His audacious appearance was rather perplexing.

"Finn?"

"Flame Princess! Are you okay? We're going to bust you out of here!" He poked his head in the gap to be seen, showing the dame his distressed and eager demeanor. Peach colored fingers slithered through the crack to aid in her escape. _That was stupid…_ Escape would not be that easy, for the mouth shut instantly and crushed his arms like insignificant twigs. Gritting his teeth he spat out an agonized "whatever" before his arms were freed from the entrapment. Despite the sickening crunch made when the fissure came down on him his arms looked as unharmed as the moment prior, which thoroughly perturbed the girl on the other side.

"We will have none of that," the sentinel exclaimed.

"How'd you know I was here?" A good question to ask, since she witnessed only a handful of people transferring her from where she fell heavily upon the earth to this baffling predicament in her personal corner of hell. Most of the few suspects were doubtful to be associated in any way with the adventurous human boy.

He rubbed his hands to endure the pain longer than she believed he could. Such ignorance of pain was almost anomalous. Nevertheless he was able to speak without further delay. "I thought you might've been in trouble after you disappeared the other day. Marceline came and told me you were captured by the Desert Kingdom, so I devised a radical plan to bust you out."

Marceline the Vampire Queen was properly acquainted with Finn? The fact that _she_ told him of the princess' capturing could only mean that the queen was the exact same vampire that challenged Étoile to managing her uncontainable anger. Marceline was involved in some of the most essential complications known to all chroniclers, and if she had wiggled her way into meddling with their affairs, than her reason for doing so must be just as essential as anything else she was involved with. That also meant the reason behind the imprisoning of a troubled teenager was far different than anticipated, possibly dealing with something other than dysfunctional personalities and extraneous wars.

He performed a series of silly hand motions that seemed to direct her to use her powers and escape through the mouth of the crag while the chance was still available. "Come on!" He reached out his and again, though not through window.

The invitation was certainly tantalizing, to say the least. It inspired the idea that the last person who had it within their power to aid in her search would be Finn. All else had ended in vain to yield a promising answer, and by going on adventures at his side they tripled their chances of running into something the princess overlooked on her ephemeral journey. In hindsight she should have chosen this path at the crossroads instead of taking it upon herself to solve these issues. "Okay. What's the plan?"

"Actually, this was the plan." _What? _His 'radical' plan was to walk up to her and take her out of the cell... How naïve he was to believe prison-breaking would be as easy as taking candy from a baby. Where was his brother who followed him around all the time? If his plan was cleverer the dog could have acted as a distraction, or maybe have even been the key to removing the boulder from the doorway. Then breaking out would be assured and they could elope on fantastic adventures with the goal of overcoming her evils. Certainly Jake was incorporated into this transpiration?

"Time's up! Boy, you better scram before we beat the pulp out of you!" No, he was not. Finn's self-elaborated plan was a failure just like her research. It was relieving to know that not everyone was not the perfect examples she thought they once were. From what she could see through the closing opening in her room the bulky form of the captain had returned to intimidate Finn out of the prison.

"I'll come back for you, Princess! I promise!"

Then it shut and Flame Princess was left to waste away in the cramped division for what felt like an eternity. A few heat-ridden projectiles followed the closing just to exemplify how infuriating it was to have salvation be snatched from her grasp. Most likely he would not come to rescue her from the aching misery of waiting until the next day. Hopefully her father did not arrive sooner than Finn so that her capturing remained unknown to him. Then it would only appear as if the Desert Kingdom was playing some sort of game. She was about to go back to sleep to expedite the waiting process and preserve her energy when the voice of the stuttering captive spoke up.

"Hey Princess, was that your boyfriend?" He said in a teasing tone of voice, deviously causing one to believe the hero was a pathetic misuse of space.

She sighed, knowing a good part of the suggestion was unfortunately true. "Yes…" If only she had been given a prince that wasn't so daft, or a prince that wasn't human. Her problems wouldn't be as numerous as they were now. Her life would be so much simpler, the difference, she was sure, incalculable. But the cosmic forces that orchestrated these follies in the first place meant for them to be experienced and embraced, not abstained from and avoided.

A whispering, a beep, and a slap on the knee followed next. In the cubicle neighboring her own the inmates were coordinating something without bothering to consult the embers. "There might be a way you can get out of this joint," said Grimby.

"Forget it. Finn will save me anyway."

"Princess, you're really ugly."

This was exactly the kind of therapy she desperately needed. Throw in a couple of insults and make her feel even worse than she already did and it was bound to reverse her frown. "You take that back!" Obviously such optimism is a difficult thing to come by. Joking aside, Flame Princess didn't need to be more confident that she was the most useless and hated creation of all time.

"You're-you're-you're tuh fattest person I've ev-r seen!"

"Beebop bo boo bleep bleep! (You make me barf!)"

"That boy doesn't love you! He loathes having anything to _do_ with you!"

"Ahh!" The ne'er-do-wells had succeeded in surpassing the limit she tried to set on her boiling anger. Now it had erupted and encouraged the flames to sprout within their cramped encasing. She didn't know where they were, but she simply had to do whatever was necessary to cause them pain for their insults. With fresh vigor the living conflagration expanded, heating up tremendously and actually beginning to burn the dry rock imprisoning her. "Take that back!" She flailed her now nondescript limbs somewhat skillfully and pounded everything they touched.

The calefaction became intolerable even for the earthen sentinel stuck in the doorway, forcing him to pull back and heal the scorched surface that pained him. "Dude, that hurts!" He left the opening unobstructed for the blaze to exit through, but she was already tearing through the barrier separating her from the hooligans. So focused was she to lay waste to their fire-prone bodies that she failed to notice that her way to Finn had been made available. However, her endeavors exhausted what little energy she had recovered during her slumber and ebbed the embers back into the shape of a harmless girl, who breathed heavily in a crumpled mess.

"It worked! We're free!" In her efforts she had drilled through to the next rather large cell that housed two pterodactyl-like hobos and a dilapidated three-eyed robot. Together they pranced out into the prison's halls and sped out of sight. Shockingly no one interrupted them on their way out, probably because they had fallen asleep on the job. The guard on the floor who moaned at the peculiarity of being singed only rolled about the ground, ineffective at executing his imperative orders.

"Get back here! I'm not done with you…" The girl lingered on the floor in an attempt to reconstruct the pieces broken to exhaustion. She wanted to chase after the escaping convicts and finish what she started, but a pause was needed first. Once enough energy was recollected she rushed out and followed the path of insanity they left behind, before she was again trapped in her cubicle. Multiple guards had left their posts to return the group to their cell, leaving the hallway deserted altogether. Within the other cages the captives were engaged in an intense brawl between the cage doors and themselves. They were all of diminutive importance to the young blaze and evidently the elementals who had captured them, and she sped past them to the staircase at the end of the hall.

Grimby, J.J., and the third anonymous prisoner were long gone by the time Flame Princess made it to the vacant wasteland outside and she had no clue where to go. In every direction there were toppled gray pillars, skeletons, and desert flora, lacking at least one monumental landmark. Each path was as good as any, so it was wild goose chase to exact revenge on the. What was a better choice was to leave this exasperating wasteland and find Finn without lollygagging. He was ironically her last hope to ending the madness between them and Marceline's challenge. With this in mind, she Princess Étoile Soleil Arianne (_AN: just to make sure you haven't forgotten how weird I made her name :D_) began what she hoped to be the final leg of her adventure._ To Finn!_

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_Note from the Author: This morning I had an epiphany about the plot of the story and I changed quite a few things around. It's not that different from the original plan, but it was enough to make it better, I suppose. Hope you guys don't mind this story is geared slightly toward a different direction than it was before._

_By the bye, I made Flame Princess have a kind of French name because Flame King said 'why' in French on "Incendium"; I only thought it fitting. Really we have nothing to go on for her real name like we did for Princess Bubblegum, so…yeah. And the hobos, they were arrested after selling the poisoned tarts to Desert Kingdom officials. Not that anyone would care if a _rock_ was forever petrified…_

_Comments:_

_DubbleDuelSword: That's the kind of reaction I was going for on that part. :)_

_AndyTheBlade: I hope this quenched your thirst to read more. _


	7. You Break It, You Buy It

**Chapter 7: You Break It, You Buy It**

Running, sprinting, flying, gliding, zooming, speeding, dashing, darting. Whatever it could be described as, she was doing it all with great haste under the peaking midday sun. Over the sand, stones, and bones, dodging rock formations, cacti, and the occasional boat, Flame Princess tried eminently to vamoose from the Desert of Doom, travelling straight to Finn and to join him on his adventure to the Spooky Forest. All in the wrong direction, most likely, as she had no clue where Finn was. The desert was vast, and to find one person in a place so expansive would be like searching for a red object submerged in a pool of molten lava. This thought had not occurred to her for quite some time, and when it did, she pulled herself to a stop close to a toppled column of taupe gray earth.

Where would he go to gather the materials needed to break her out of prison? From what she saw, his isolated tree house in the grasslands was full of junk, weapons, and treasure. It was entirely possible Finn scurried back to his abode to recover the most commodious of his reserves. "The sun rises in the east… and sets in the west…" said she, deep in thought. Recalling everything she learned about knowing which cardinal direction belonged where, the princess discovered north was to her left. Somewhat southeast of the desert was her own homeland the Fire Kingdom, which was only so far directly south from the grasslands. That meant going northwest would bring her somewhere in the vicinity of the lattermost goal. It proved to be an accurate assumption, for several moments of traversing later the creamy, apricot colored sands gave way to lush chartreuse grasses.

Again the alacritous session was interrupted, this time by a peculiar looking structure at the edge of the forest she burned on her preceding visit. The candle girl slowed down in front of the construction erected only out of shrubbery, barbed vines, and a metal gate. A number of the vines were oriented into the shape of a goblin's face, which beyond doubt struck her as queer. Finn and Jake's residence was located not too far from this peculiar structure, so the following investigation that was required to suppress her curiosity would not too far off track.

Upon closer inspection Flame Princess noticed the steel gate was arranged to keep unwanted visitors out. However, the only flaw in having such a gate was that the building had no roof, only crude organic walls and could effortlessly be bypassed by an individual capable of flying. Of course, with a fire elemental there was always the option of incinerating the walls out of the way, but that meant risking the loss of whatever treasures may lie at the other side. Easily she morphed her body into an arch of writhing blazes over the hindrance and landed in a flash at the other side, the impish wind nearly splaying the embers back onto the hedge.

What lay before her was an agrarian asylum, a veritable garden of vegetation bearing mutated fruit. While a handful of the so-called fruit were simple wheels and a distinct puncture through their center, others were like eccentrically clothed clouds, topped with a crown of multihued dapples. Their smell was sweet and enticing, practically begging for the fruits to be defiled and possibly even consumed by the auspicious tourist. Answering the alluring call she almost immediately snatched one and conveyed it under a probing gaze. Her insidious touch had it distorted -to a heap of ash and cinders, a similar reaction to all things organic. Even in its new appearance the burned produce still smelled extraordinarily aromatic and looked as appetizing as the consumables custom to the Fire Kingdom. Taking a bite surely wouldn't harm anyone save the princess herself.

_Mmm!_ It held true to her inferences and had the most heavenly zest ever known to her atypical taste buds. It soothed her incapacitating hunger and replaced it with pure comfort. Although the taste did not resemble the aroma as much as one would have surmised, it certainly was equally sweet. If ice cream tasted like this, she would happily indulge in consuming it with her princely Finn. It definitely was a taste worth savoring, a bane of all displeasures. She impulsively hoarded an armful of the delectable treats and waited until each single one was thoroughly overcooked like the first and each following in its path to her waiting mouth. Before heading well on her way to the lonesome willow she gathered another collection and coagulated it down to a portative chunk to carry with her. And she was about to get away with stealing them, if a spindling witch didn't stop her in her tracks.

"Resimafoo!" she cried, replacing the location of both herself and the thief who dared show their face in a witch's garden. She positioned her elongated spine into a defensive pose in an effort to keep the thief from escaping. The act of trading places startled Flame Princess enough to make her drop the carbonic bundle of saccharinity, leaving her absolutely dumbfounded. "Get your hands away from my precious donuts!"

"They're really good," replied the royal teen, retrieving the dropped bundle and subconsciously taking a tiny nibble.

"Oh yeah? Well you can't have them! They're mine!" Wielding her cane as a wand she unfettered a pulse of magic to again knock the delicacy from the hands. The bundle then rose into the air, uncompressed itself, and returned to its former glory of various donuts in their rightful resting places. The witch patted and kissed them comfortingly, deliriouslysaying, "There, there, my darlings, you're okay now. That meanie won't hurt you anymore." She resumed consoling them so for an entire minute until she turned to the curious intruder and bid her an ornery farewell. "Go away before I take away whatever powers you have!"

"Can't I just take a few more?" This question aroused an aggravated outburst from the nameless sorceress, and she proceeded to chant unrepeatable phrases and fire questionable blue beams at Flame Princess. Swiftly she avoided being pummeled by the barrage of unspecified spells and hotfooted to the nearest bush of delectable sweets. One of the projectiles barely missed an amber shoulder and whizzed toward a group of the clothed clouds, to which she knew not the respectable name. "You want a fight? I'll give you a fight!" Her retaliation involved her signature fireballs that were properly deflected by the target. The deflected fireballs now changed course for an abandoned log laying indifferently on the garden floor and set fire to it. The log was hardly paramount. Having failed with the fireballs FP conjured an emblazoned sword and swiped at her competitor, only to have it confiscated and discarded onto the log.

"Enough! Magichasnomoreacost!" The final zap actually hit the dame and shrouded her in a repressive cobalt mist. After the beclouding magic subsided it exposed an altered physique of Flame Princess. Her glowing body and flowing hot pink (_AN: Debatable)_ dress had been overridden by the lower half of a human baby with matching blue stripped underwear. It even emphasized the areas of pudginess that normally would not be so strikingly obvious under contrary conditions.

The hot head glanced down at her hideous, magic-daubed, peach-colored form and gasped. "What did you do to me!?" It was as if she was no longer _feminine_, what with a manly figure and masculine undergarment. Her face remained immaculate, her skin a shade of amber and her hair a vibrant red, but the flickering flame her hair shaped itself in now lay listlessly behind her. It was a rather subtle transformation, compared to Jeffrey's unconventional setup with circling stones.

A mocking laugh and a twirling of the staff was all the necessary response to show the hag won the skirmish. "I stripped you of your magical powers and now you're a just a helpless little whelp that I can easily crush beneath my feet! Ahahaha!"

"You mean… I can't burn anything?" She was practically speechless. The fact that she unintentionally stumbled upon a solution to the complications of being an untouchable fire elemental was hardly believable, and she almost wanted to agree with the incredulous side of her that said it was a curse as opposed to an endowment. It would make her former troubles fulfilled in vain.

"Yes, and you can only get them back if you-" The prospect of Flame Princess reaching for another donut to prove the witch's assertion prevented further elucidation. "Don't touch those!" Wagging her cane forebodingly failed to disrupt the thievery any more than her dogmatic orders, and another treat was stolen as a result. It didn't crumble into a mound of cinders, which made the guest shine with sheer bliss. Quite the opposite reaction expected from someone who just had a curse entwined in their fortune, to say the least.

Nevertheless, the princess gulped the treat in its whole original form and smiled at the new taste. She didn't mind the babbling of the lanky sorceress as she sprinted toward the paradise's only exit and entrance. The key to the metal gate was laced onto a skeleton that protruded from the perilous hedge, and wasted no time unlocking her way back to Finn. _This is unbelievable!_ she thought excitedly. If only she knew of this place earlier, she would have instantly stolen the donuts to anxiously receive the genuine gift of humanity. Screw being a fire elemental, being a human beats that any day! A life devoid of any impending worries dawned on the azure horizon, but first came the issue of clothing. Royalty such as her shouldn't be seen in public virtually nude. However foul it was, she had to resort to returning to Sir Nelly's castle of rubbish. It held every discarded peripheral in the book, even clothes ranging from mostly decrepit to mint condition.

Once shielded from the sinking sun by the thick foliage, she had a shopping spree of her own, all the while limiting her olfactory senses from grasping the inanely obligatory stench of deep. It took quite an amount time to find a suitable dress that could avidly be attributed to the mark of royalty and not something pulled from the garbage heap, in spite of its origins. Thankfully the sturdy ogre did not bother her in her ferreting, for she hardly thought she was in a state to put up much of a fight. Had he found her on his property a second time he surely would have beaten her to an unrecognizable pulp.

Anyway, the dress she picked out was of fine quality, made in a delicate hue of amaranth and neatly spread outward around the waist. It was sleeveless like the one prior, only it had one thick strap along the left shoulder. A seam snaked asymmetrically around the lower half, separating the top from a skirt of alternating chestnut ruffles. Here and there the cloth appeared to be tattered with age. Not really her style, but from the limited selection she had no choice but to clothe herself in it. Analyzing it completely, it began to remind her of something her mother would have worn years ago, though most of her mother's wardrobe withheld attire that was more… provocative. After tightening the laces on her back and spraying herself with an ancient can of fragrance, she escaped the fetidness of the garbage and made her way to her desired location.

Unfortunately she was unable to reach that location, for the Vampire Queen drifted in her path. Surprisingly the bass-axe she clutched in her hands before was nowhere to be seen. "You can't be serious right now…" she said.

"What?" Did her choice in clothing make her look repulsive? Did her new man-baby body show through the dress? Self-consciously Flame Princess attempted to primp herself to be sure none of the above suggestions were applicable.

"You didn't let that crazy witch take away your powers, did you?"

"Yeah-"

"Are you stupid or something?" The vampiric teenager glided casually around the princess and sighed heavily. "You're a _fire elemental_! You can't live without your fire powers-that's exactly what you're made of! It's impossible. It's like a vampire without its teeth." She hovered close to the rolling hills so that her point could be understood without any distractions or deviations. "Without your powers you'll gradually fade into nothing and there would be no way we could ever get you back from the 37th dead world."

As if on cue the girl's right arm simply vanished, leaving only a searing pain in its absence. _I knew it was too good to be true! _What trickery ensued! The gruesome human bones and innards of her shoulder were unavoidably left out for the air. She cringed and tried to grab hold of it, thinking it was merely invisible. But this was not the case. It was indeed nonexistent and had nothing to surrogate it. "So what-do I do-now?" she tried to ask, finding it difficult to ignore her missing arm. The pain slowly became forgotten and took its remnants with it.

Marceline flew back and readied herself in the wind. "I'm going to teleport you back to the garden, to save you some time. You'll have to use what you learned on your little trip to make her give you your powers back."

"Right, anger isn't always the best solution…" Even though one or two occasions proved this to be true, Étoile still felt in situations it was the only key to sure victory. Take the prison break for instance; had she not lost her temper on those foul-hearted miscreants, she would not have had enough energy to burn the guard lodged in her doorway. Or even before that, when she first met Finn. Her rage of being so frequently mistreated by him brought to light that he was as innocent as her. Then again, if she ignored the miscreants and waited another day for Finn to return to the Desert of Doom, there stood the chance that he might possibly have been able to break her from the imprisonment. And if she withheld her temper to hear what Finn had to say on that fateful day, she eventually would have learned the true nature of her hero. Altogether, the topic of anger was somewhat of a conundrum to her.

The next moment she was in the presence of the wonderland, just outside the gate she so recently flung ajar. Marceline hadn't bothered to warn her that she was being teleported at that very moment. No matter-she was here now, and it was time to decide her course of action. Would a docile approach return her flames to her as much as being tenacious and forcefully taking what was justifiably hers? That was the question the blaze asked herself. It interested her to see what being the nicest person in Ooo would bring her. After years of using abrupt force to try to modify things her way, that sort of information was derelict to her. Mustering her meager reserves of docility, she walked ever so serenely to confront the witch.

The old hag stood tending to the flaming wood, ablaze courtesy of Flame Princess. She held above its dancing edges a bubbling potion of sorts, and threw it aside at the sight of the thief. Who knew what mischief it caused in its concealed crash site. "Ah, so you've finally realized that my curse is a punishment and you've come back to apologize?" She gloated more than was physically possible that she righted the princess' wrongs.

"Yes."

"OH YEAH! IN YOUR FACE, GIRLY!"

She then displayed the most innocent, most contrite face she knew of, kneeled down in front the witch, and pleaded with her left arm. "Can I have my powers back, please?" Her left leg perished next, destroying her equilibrium and making her topple over. It was as agonizing as losing right arm, if not worse with the addition of coming in rather brutal contact with the ground. "Please hurry, I'll disappear to the 37th dead world if you don't!"

Her penitence had little effect on the witch and she continued to stare bluntly at the point of the pleading. But the pitiful sight of a squirming limbless girl welled an aquifer of contemplation. It made one think she wanted nothing of debauchery, when in fact she did. She brought her thaumaturgic cane to her face while her hand rubbed a periwinkle-skinned chin.

"Hurry up!" Her patience was running thin and withered. It wouldn't come as a surprise if she erupted right then and there. She struggled to sit straight up, drew out her hand for the burning wood, and attempted to salvage her powers by absorbing the fire.

"Don't rush me, girly! …What did you say your name was?"

"I'm the Flame Princess!"

That seemed to make all the difference. The witch appeared to have had a revelation, one that warned her of the repercussions for deporting the daughter of the passionately vigilant King Ignatius to a dead world. He would surely enact revenge with retribution more horrendous than what had been bestowed upon poor innocent Flame Princess. "Oh, well why didn't you say so in the first place? Let me just give you back your powers… Normicus formicus!"

Sheepishly the magic flowed from the cane and into the dame, reinstating the inherent beauty of her undying fires. "Yesss…" The life flowed back into her hair and, miraculously, both limbs lost to insanity rematerialized in their respective sockets. Admittedly, it wasn't the best solution to dousing her flames, but perhaps there was some way to provisionally simulate the outcomes so well defined in this little mishap, without any vanishing extremities. Her dress burned promptly and was no sooner replaced by the synthetic dress the princess conjured. Stretching, the dame exhibited her restored might of fire by reaching toward the sky and spraying vermillion embers in all directions of the garden. In an instant every shrub, bush and sapling beholden to the garden rose in a frenzy of malign colors. "That's for humiliating me."

The garden's caretaker was simply mortified. No response, no movement, maybe a disconsolate stuttering; she just stood and stared as the young blaze had obliterated everything she lived for. Yes, there was the prospect of magic, where all that had been lost could be reestablished… but the witch didn't move a muscle. Not even when the princess left did she thaw herself from her mortified state. She got exactly what she deserved, putting FP through that traumatizing near-death experience. Any additional time squandered and it was off to the 37th dead world, exclusive of the pleasure of Finn goofiness. On her way out she obligated herself to taking with her a handful of burnt donuts and other sweets.

Outside the perilous goblin-faced walls of the desecrated paradise Marceline waited patiently on an invisible recliner. There was no doubt she witnessed everything that just occurred. "Good one, candle girl." The two shared a jovial bout of laughter and let it die when it became awkward, so long after the tacit joke was thoroughly appreciated.

"I'm gonna go back to Finn now."

The Vampire Queen stopped her chuckling and instantiated her musical instrument from nowhere. "Finn's not at his house. He left for the Candy Kingdom a little while ago to hang out with Bonnibel."

"Who?"

"Good ol' Princess Bubblegum." She allowed herself to stray away as she got into the grove of a song. Lethargically she glanced back in Flame Princess' direction. "She's like the smartest person in Ooo. Maybe she can help fix your problems." Interesting; things were either changing for better, or for worse. Now instead of looking for something she believed was impractical to find, possibilities simply fell into her lap. The ordeal with the sorceress certainly didn't end well, but it was as enlightening as being a lightening elemental. _You never know if it works out unless you try it…_

"Um, could you take me there?" The royal teen felt that flying the distance to the Candy Kingdom was such a chore. And with someone who could teleport entire entities, why not let them do the work instead?

"Sure. I want to see for myself how this all goes down…"

* * *

_Note from the Author: This was more like a filler chapter. It just does its job and brings us to the right spot for the, well, 'finale' of the whole fiction. I don't know if Marceline can teleport anything, I just thought the idea would work with the fanfiction. Also, if you haven't noticed, the title can go both ways…_


	8. Unfortunate Turn of Events

_Note from Author: Unfortunately, I have to take a quick break before I am able to post the last two chapters. School has started for me and I barely have enough time to work on this as of now. Classic excuse, I know, but when it happens it happens and there's little you can do about it. Plus, I want to make sure that what I do write is perfect before you guys read it. Sorry!_


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